Opening Scenes
by Trscroggs
Summary: Theses are story fragments written as ideas more than anything else. Some will be expanded into full stories eventually, some will not.
1. Agent D

"Status report!"

"Explosion in secondary drive array! Charge dumps 2 through 6 are unstable! Phase bubble is beginning to resynchronize with real space! Twenty minutes until field collapse!"

"Commander we're almost two weeks out from the objective, there's no way we're going to make it in this condition. An unstable phase collapse will destroy us for sure."

"Navigation; I need a stopping spot. I don't care where and I don't care about the condition, point us to the closest star system."

"I have an old survey world. It's a yellow sun, close to our own in frequency. Gravity telescopes detected gas giants, but survey never followed up. It'll be tight, but we should be able to make it before the field give out."

"Get us there now."

OoOoOoO

"Let's start from the top. Damage report."

"Secondary drive array is totaled. It will take star dock support to repair it. The main array is still functional, but it's going to need to be handheld for the rest of the mission. We completely lost the 2nd and 5th charge dumps; I might be able to get the other damaged ones back to some degree of functionality after they are empty. Other repairs aren't so critical, but most of them are beyond my ability to repair without parts."

"Summarize our operation condition."

"Our drive endurance is less than 5 days; life support is strained, but functional. We lost about half our weapon systems but the barrier system is still charged. Scanners are still working, but at limited range."

"Speaking of scanners; Navigation, what's in our neighborhood?"

"It's a pretty crowded system. We have four rocky planets closest to the sun; then four gas giants with the usual mix of gases. Lots of lose space rocks and moons, so raw material shouldn't be a problem. Then we turned on our radio beacon and things got interesting."

"Interesting?"

"Third planet out has active radio broadcasts. We've stumbled into an inhabited system."

"Damn, don't tell me we violated the Accords on top of everything else?"

"Don't think so. There wasn't a marker beacon when we came in. I think we've stumbled onto a true first contact."

"Sir, if they're advanced enough to put radio signals out this far we might be able to adapt some of their equipment to improve our repairs. It'd increase our odds of completing the mission significantly."

"That's in total violation of the spirit of the Accords!"

"Only if reveal ourselves. Nothing in the Accords prevents us from taking supplies on as long as they don't know where the parts are going."

"I'm opposed…"

"I'm sorry counselor, but our mission is too vital, anything that increases our chances has to be done. Do even know if we can make meaningful contact?"

"The audio broadcasts have been easy so far, not that the language is the database of course, we reason to believe there is a visual component in many of the signals. Decoding it has been impossible, we simply don't have compatible equipment."

"Launch a drone. Have it ghost up to the planet and gather some real data."

"Roger."

OoOoOoO

"Agent D reporting as requested Commander."

"Agent D, good timing, sit down please. I'll get straight to the point; I need you to take on a potentially dangerous volunteer-only mission."

"Sir?"

"I'm sure you've heard the rumors; we are landing a small team on the inhabited planet to perform a supply survey. That team is going to need competent field support that can keep cool in completely unknown situations. You're one of the best qualified on the ship."

"Isn't Agent Y more senior?"

"Agent y is more senior, but YOU fit the local phenotype. You'll only need minimal reworking to blend in completely with what we think is a local standard. We have a real shortage of people qualified, but the mission's too risky to force anyone into it."

"Have you received any other volunteer's sir?"

"You're actually filling the last slot. Engineering has loaned us Lieutenant Jactof to perform the actual survey. Counselor He is going along to make sure we don't violate the Accords in any major way. Finally, your backup is going to be Agent Q."

"Agent Q and I aren't on the best of terms Sir, are you sure you want me along?"

"Simply put Agent D, you and Agent Q are the only two agents on board that can pass amongst the natives without major difficulties. Your support is going to be absolutely vital for this mission."

*Sigh* "I'll do it sir, but I'd like a report logged that I had objections to working with Agent Q."

"So noted. Thank you Agent D, return safely"

OoOoOoO

"Fortunately, Agent D, you only need a couple of cosmetic changes to blend in to the locals. We're changing the color of your hair and the tint of your eyes and that should cover all the changes."

"What about the others?"

"Lieutenant Jactof is Thorian too so his changes are minimal. Counselor He and Agent Q are Dipian though, and their natural skin tone has not been seen through our observations, so we are changing that to resemble your own."

*Wince* "I'm sure that went over well. What's our cover?"

"The protests were quite loud. As for cover, we've seen a lot of four member families in this region, 2 adult and 2 children per group. Because of differences in height, Agent Q and you have drawn the 'child' roles."

"Lovely. Does this family group have a name yet?"

"Some wag decided to call it the Dipian word for 'guest'. Morgendorffer I think."

OoOoOoO

"Agent D reporting in. How's the signal home base?"

"Spotty Agent D, but readable. What are conditions on the surface really like?"

"The air is a lot thinner here than what I would consider normal. At sea level it's the equivalent of 2,000 feet on my home world. We aren't having trouble yet, but we're going to have to stay out of the higher altitudes. The Lieutenant and I think its pretty damn cold too, but the counselor and Agent Q are comfortable enough."

"Meet any locals yet?"

"A few. They're pretty much like every other intelligent pre-Crisis species. Some are decent, some are jerks, and some are absolute idiots. I'm not finding any really good examples of the species at the education center I have been assigned to, but it could just be regional."

"Education center?"

"This region has mandatory joint education, and the covers assigned both Agent Q and myself are within the requirements. I'll need to thank the people who thought that up later. Regardless, it has given me a look at some of the 'official' history. Nothing that really stands out there; again fairly typical of a pre-Crisis species."

"As expected really. Any signs of psionic talent in the population?"

"Just a lot of natural resistance so far. The structure of their neural tissue is probably the most disorganized I've ever seen. I haven't had a lot of problems getting active thoughts or language reading, but trying to access anything else is like trying to use a reference database without an expert system. If I get anything relevant at all it was pure luck."

"Anything I need to alert the captain about?"

"Just one so far, but it's critical. Anything we get from the planet needs to be decontaminated every way we can think of before letting it onboard. **EVERY** way."

"Agent D?"

"Remember how I said their brains are disorganized? Well their immune systems are anything but. I haven't seen a better organized, or outright hostile, immune system in any intelligent species I've ever studied, even the carrion eaters."

"Are you sure about that Agent D?"

"We ran the mandatory health check after the first day and all of our pan-immunity treatments had ramped up to full power. This world has so many infectious agents we're going to have to drop a plague beacon when we leave. It doesn't bother the natives much because they evolved into it, but you need to outright forbid anyone without stage 3 immunization treatment from setting foot on this planet."

"So noted Agent D. Now, about the local technology…"

OoOoOoO

"Now 'Daria', 'Quinn' I know it will be hard getting use to a new area, but relocating here has halved the time I need to get all the components on our wish list. Do try to tolerate the locals; we don't need a repeat of the last incident." Lieutenant Jactof told his 'children' as he transported them to their new school.

"I stand by my actions," Agent D, aka Daria Morgendorffer, replied. "The species was nothing but improved with what I did to those two idiots."

"I hate to agree with Daria," said Agent Q, aka Quinn Morgendorffer, "But if I had more contact with them I probably would have done something drastic too, but a lot sooner. I could FEEL my intelligence dropping every time I went near them!"

'Jake' Morgendorffer sighed, "Regardless, **please** try to be a bit more subtle. If these humans are a hard to read as you say then we have to avoid anything that requires you having to try to remove memories."

"Ok 'dad' if I have time to I'll clear anything drastic with 'mom' first. But I make no promises if there is an emergency."

Jake's grin was rueful as he pulled up to Lawndale High School. "Since you both outrank me I guess that's the best I can ask for. But hey, maybe you'll find someone to talk to at this new school."

"I always find someone to talk to," Daria said as she and Quinn left the car, "The problem is finding someone **worth** talking to."

Daria watched Quinn approach a small group of students outside the school. With her psionic gifts turned up, Daria 'felt' as Quinn gained access to the language zones of the student's brains. "_Not bad_," Daria thought to herself, "_Probably smoother than I would be with that many targets_."

The powerful psionic began looking for someone to 'borrow' the language from, _"But she really needs to learn that quality means more than quantity in most scenarios."_ Running a quick mental 'feeler' over the crowd of students Daria lightly synched herself to the student that she 'felt' the most mental activity from. They had formed language links for Jake and Helen already, but it never hurt to pick up the appropriate local slang.

OoOoOoO

After school she entered her English classroom and took a seat near the front in time and listened to the instructor going on and tried to take notes but quickly ran into a problem.

"_This 'teacher' doesn't have a damn idea what he is talking about_." Daria thought as she tried to follow Mr. O'Neil's speech through his thoughts.

"He doesn't know what it means. He's got the speech memorized. Just enjoy the nice man's soothing voice." A girl's voice came quietly from the desk behind her. Daria turned to look to the student, a dark haired female in bright red clothing.

"Sorry," the girl continued, "I noticed the look of confusion that everyone wears after listening to Timothy 'Crybaby' O'Neil. Name's Jane Lane, you?"

"Daria Morgendorffer. How does anyone expect to get anything out of this little social experiment if he doesn't know the material?"

Jane shrugged, "The only ones expecting anyone to get anything is Mr. O'Neil. This class is here to keep the undesirable busy. The students are just a bonus. I can fill you in later. I've taken this course six times."

"Agreed."

OoOoOoO

"I don't get it, Jane. You've got the entire course memorized. How come you can't pass the test to get out?" Daria asked intrigued.

"I could pass the test, but I like having low self-esteem. It makes me feel special." Jane answered.

Daria grinned both internally, but 'reached' for Jane anyway to verify the glib answer. To her shock Daria felt her probe begin slide to into Jane's mind with a suddenness she had never felt before.

"_The hell?!" _Daria thought while yanking her gift back. Withdrawing the mental probe took a sudden mental effort that left Daria unaware of her surroundings for just an instant, plenty of time for her still moving body to take a tumble.

"You ok amiga?" Jane asked.

"Mostly," Daria gritted out. Finding her left knee bleeding Daria was suddenly grateful that her species' blood was the same color as Jane's. "But I'm going to have to do something about the bleeding."

"My place is just around the corner. I've got a first aid kit that should have some Band-Aids in it. Think you can make it?"

Wincing, Daria climbed to her feet with Jane's help. Testing her leg Daria found it could bear her weight. "I think so."

A few minutes found Daria sitting on a counter as Jane preformed simple first aid. "That should do it," Jane said, examining her work, "I guess I owe you for not catching you. Want to share a pizza?"

"Afraid not," Daria wasn't able to hide a wince in time. "I have lots of food allergies; can't eat anywhere I haven't checked the ingredient list. Maybe I can take you up on it after I've checked them out."

Both Thorians had discovered that while they did share a close resemblance to humans that hadn't fully extended to their diet. Careful food tests made when they first landed had proved that several processed food additives could be potentially lethal to the pair. As Dipian's Quinn and Helen actually had better compatibility than Daria and Jake, they still had to be careful though.

"Damn. That must suck." Jane said after a quick confirming glance told her Daria wasn't joking.

"You learn to adapt. I've gotten pretty good at making bagged meals and even better at reading ingredient labels."

Jane nodded, "So what do you do for fun? Me, I paint and…"

OoOoOoO


	2. Cardcaptor Daria

Ok, I know I should be working on In Silence Sarcastic, but this bunny hit me knees with a sledgehammer and I figured if I wrote it down it would go away.

This is entirely a one-shot. I may add a scene or two later, but I don't intend to continue this.

Since I don't want to spoil anything, though it should be obvious in a hurry, more detailed author notes are at the bottom.

OoOoOoOoOoOoO

Daria Morgendorffer, Raft sophomore, pushed her book cart through the empty stacks on Raft's largest library after-hours. The part-time librarian job was less than ideal, but since it was a relatively easy way to get spending cash Daria worked hard enough to insure she kept it.

The job did have a few upsides. One was the keys, and permission, to head into parts of the stacks only dedicated researchers ever treed. Daria admitted she like the idea of the thought of hidden treasures within the faded brown and dull red covers of the library's oldest general circulation tomes.

It during one of these 'treasure hunts' that Daria stumbled across a treasure worth far more than words.

Even later, Daria would never be able to say what drew her eyes to the book. Maybe it was the brilliant crimson cover, not faded at all like its neighbors. Maybe it was its size, much thicker than the books adjacent to it. Or maybe it was something else entirely. Regardless of the real reason, Daria removed the book from its shelf, setting in motion something that would change her life forever.

OoOoOoO

The tome was bright red, Daria noted, and its cover was embossed with a winged lion is a guarding pose. The book's spine had no title or filing information, but the word 'Clow' was written on the front cover.

"What is a book like you doing here?" Daria mussed to herself. She flipped the front cover open, planning on searching for the book's copyright page. She did not notice the tiny amount of resistance that broke as she lifted the cover.

"Ok, not a book." Daria mussed, as the interior of the 'book' revealed that instead of text, the book contained a hollow space filled with taro cards.

Daria pulled the top card out to examine it more closely. It didn't resemble any of the taro cards Daria had seen before. On it was a very intricate drawing of a woman clad in wind, below the drawing, a single English word was written in a boilerplate. Daria read the text out loud.

"Windy."

It would be the last thing she would remember for quite some time.

OoOoOoO

A sharp stinging pain on her face brought Daria out of unconsciousness. The moment Daria's brain finished restarting it almost shut down again in shock.

The stack Daria had been in looked like it had been hit by a bomb. Shelves were blown over, books scattered everywhere, and the grungy tiles on the floor ahead of her were simply gone, exposing the concrete underneath. Daria slowly climbed to her feet, eyes fixed on the devastation, ignoring everything around her. Unfortunately for her, the things around her were not returning the favor.

Daria felt another stinging pain on her face and a high voice cut though some of her shock.

"Pay some damn attention, yo!"

Daria turned her head towards the voice, but she couldn't see its source. That's when something moved directly into her line of vision that almost sent Daria back into unconsciousness.

"It's about damn time. I thought you were going to just lay there until you bleed to death, yo."

The voice was coming from a something that so much resembled a stuffed toy that Daria's mind simply refused to comprehend it. The tiny figure resembled a child's lion, with small white wings on its back. If she had been in less shock Daria would have ignored the toy, but not only was the voice coming from it, but it was also floating directly in front of her face. It was then that Daria's brain comprehended the meaning of the words she was hearing.

"Bleeding?" She asked in a daze.

The little flying lion sighed. "You're in shock, yo. Check yourself out; you're clothes are all messed up and you're bleeding all over, yo."

Absentmindedly Daria settled her classes properly on her face and did as the voice asked. Her appearance did much to blow the fog out of her mind.

Out of all the clothing in her favorite outfit only her boots might be salvageable. Her fateful jacket was literally half gone. The entire left side was completely missing and what little remained of the right side was nothing more than tatters. Daria felt an involuntary blush rise on her face when she realized the t-shirt and bra that had been underneath were similarly destroyed. Her skirt resembled a nothing more than belt hung with party streamers and the shoelaces on right boot had been severed.

More importantly, Daria suddenly realized, her body had several cuts on it. Most were very shallow and no longer bleeding, but several were in precarious places, including a slice on her tight that apparently bleed for quite some time before stoping.

"Damn it. This looks bad." Daria said to herself. "But I'll never be able to explain it." Daria began to limp towards the change of clothing she knew was in the front office.

"Wait yo!" The lion declared. "You have to take this stuff with you. You won't be in any shape to come back for it later, yo."

Daria looked at the lion, and noticed that it was hovering over the book she could remember pulling from the shelf. The book laid open face down on the floor in the center of the blast. Not knowing why, Daria limped over and retrieved the book, also picking up the card that was trapped underneath. At the lion's direction, she put the card in the book and closed the cover tightly. She then carefully dressed in the emergency sweats hidden in the library office before returning to her dorm room and taking out the first aid kit her father had insisted she take with her.

Ignoring the little lion's attempts to get her attention, Daria patched her worse cuts to the best of her ability. After the last major cut was sealed a wave of exhaustion hit Daria so hard she barely made it to her own bed before passing out.

OoOoOoO

The sun sneaking through the blinds woke Daria the next morning. She laid aching in bed for several minutes, Daria soon noticed the sound of her roommate's keyboard.

"Good morning, Daniel." Daria began. "You would never believe the dream I had last . . . ."

That was when Daria noticed that it was NOT her roommate typing on her keyboard, but the little lion from the dream. At the sound of her voice the little lion stopped typing and flew over to her.

"It's about time you woke up, yo. I was starting to get worried. Can't have the Cardcaptor dieing before she finished her task, yo."

Daria drew her knees to her chest, staring at the flying lion. "You can't be real. You were just a dream. There's no way that could have been real."

The little lion flew close and swiped at Daria's nose with a paw. Daria quickly covered her stinging nose, noticing a tiny amount of blood as she pulled her hand away.

"Oh it was real all right, yo. And the disaster you set into motion last night is real too, yo. You _**are**_ going to fix it, yo."

Daria blinked. "Disaster? What disaster? Who are you, what is that book, and what the hell is going on?"

The lion sighed, "I guess I do owe you an explanation, yo."

Straightening, the lion's voice took on a lecturing tone.

"A long time ago, a power wizard called Clow Reed attempted to combine English and Chinese magic into an entirely new system of power. He tried to both create and capture powerful sprits in the form of cards that other could then use to summon that force to act on their behalf. He succeeded."

"It wasn't until after he made the first few cards that Clow realized how dangerous what he was creating was. A lot of the sprits did want to stay as cards, and they tried to escape him whenever he wasn't using them. Seeing this, Clow created a container to hold the cards, to prevent them from running amok without direction."

"That book?" Daria questioned.

"That's the one," The lion agreed. "That much power in one place attracted the greedy, however, so Clow created two guardians to protect the book Cerberus and Yue."

"And a very good job you did too," was Daria's sarcastic reply.

"Hey, I'm not finished talking, yo! The guardians aren't supposed to prevent people from using the book; they're supposed to test the users, to see if they're worthy, yo."

"Somehow, I doubt I'm worthy."

"Not yet you're not, yo. Anyway; just before he died, Clow sealed the book to prevent casual access. Yue and I were asleep for so long, we had trouble waking up when you broke the seal, yo. Then you invoked Windy and it blew the cards damn near everywhere. It's your job to get them back, yo."

"The hell it is, yo. You scattered the cards, you pick them up, yo. Otherwise the deaths will be on your head, yo."

"Deaths?"

"The cards are free for the first time in maybe a century, yo. They're waking up and are going to start going crazy without guidance, yo. Some of the cards are harmless, but a bunch of them are disasters in the making, yo."

"What kind of disasters? Are we talking howling dogs, losing cable, fires, or earthquakes?"

"All of the above, yo. And that's just for starters. The Clow Cards represent incredible forces. Earthquake are the least Earthy could do for instance. Sudden mountains appearing are more it's speed, yo. They'll destroy this city, then move on to the rest of the world."

"And it's my job to catch them why?"

"Three things, yo. One; you have enough magic to break the seal Clow put on the book and invoke Windy. You'll need that kind of power to catch the rowdier spirits. Two; when you invoked Windy she scattered the cards all over. That makes it your fault, yo."

The little lion straightened up, and suddenly its voice deepened and began to resonate with power. "And third; because I am Cerberus, guardian of the Book of Clow Reed, and _**I say**_ it's your job."

Daria swallowed, but tried to conceal her sudden burst of nervousness. "Just say I agree to do this, what can I do to stop these things?"

The guardian's jovial mask fell back into place, and its tone returned to normal. "That's easy." Cerberus flew over to the book and pulled something off of it with his teeth. He flew back over to Daria and dropped the tiny object on her lap. Daria picked up this object to get a closer look, and noticed that it was little charm that resembled a wizard's staff.

"A little small don't you think?" Daria asked.

"Goes to show what you know, yo." Cerberus replied. "That's its travel form. You hold in your hands the Wand of Clow Reed, yo. You can use it to both invoke and seal the cards. It is lot more efficient than doing trying to invoke without it, yo."

Daria closed her eyes and thought deeply for several minutes.

"Okay, I'll do it." She said. "But only until you find someone who will do a better job."

"Humph, sounds good to me, yo. In that case; in the name of Clow Reed, and with my authority as Guardian Cerberus, I name you Cardcaptor Daria."

Daria blinked. "If you never call me that again, I won't compare you to a plushy."

"Deal."

The two 'shook' on it, forever altering Daria's fate. It would be some time before Daria realized how by how much.

OoOoOoO

Daria Morgendorffer in:

Cardcaptor Daria

Aka

The Reluctant Mage

OoOoOoOoOoOoO

And this is where the story stops. I don't plan on writing any more, but if someone wants to continue it, let me know.

For those who haven't guessed, this is a fusion of Daria and Cardcaptor Sakura.

Like a lot of kids anime, if you knock off the 'kiddy' the series has a lot of deep themes. I decided to set the fusion after Daria graduated from Lawndale because of this.

This isn't a one-to-one fusion. Daria is not directly related to Clow like Sakura was. Instead she was the first person with enough magic to break the seal to stumble across the book. Yue isn't pretending to be Trent or Tom. And while Jane would want to make Daria an outfit or two, if she knew what Daria was doing, she isn't as obsessed about it as Tomoyo is.

The damage the escaped cards do is quite real, and several people will be imperiled by their existence at the very least. It is very likely that somebody, maybe even somebody Daria knows, will be killed, quite probably in a pretty bad way. In the original manga several people, including Sakura herself, almost drown when Watery goes berserk. In another, a card who's only power is to create flowers almost smoothers a school yard.

Omake: (Occurs later in series)

Daria was woken out of a deep sleep by the feeling of a great weight settling upon her. Her eyes flew open to see the 'true' form of Cerberus, a large winged lion, sitting on her chest.

"By the way," Cerberus began when he noticed Daria was awake, "there are some things I wanted to go over real quick."

Cerberus very deliberately began ticking points off on his claws, the shortest of which was longer than Daria's fingers.

"One: I am Cerberus the guardian of a book of magical mass destruction. Now that my powers are restored, I am NOT just a animal mascot."

"Two: I know where you sleep."

"And three: I talk how I want to talk, yo."


	3. Memetic Books

It is a world just like our own. In fact until right around the time Daria is born everything is completely normal. Then the first memetic book came out.

These books contain ideas that are more than just text, they're infectious. Anyone reading memetic text may find their way of thinking altered to fit the pattern in the text, and rarely are these changes completely benign.

People being people, the backlash was severe. There were many book burnings, hangings, and government legislation. The US government stepped in and created an 'approved book' stamp, which represents the government's assurance that the stamped book contains no memetic viruses. Of course, the committee that approves the stamps is a political entity, and it has its own agenda. Some books that have existed safely for centuries, but disagree with current politics, are not approved for instance.

OoOoOoO

Highland's reaction reflects a lot of small towns, with only a few additional extremes. The town library is shut down, never to reopen. The local bookstores have their, completely harmless, stock burned by angry mobs. One used books seller was lynched, another barely escaped.

Eventually the panic eroded and things settled to a new mostly bookless normal. One class of book that didn't go away were textbooks. One would think the sudden discovery that text could be dangerous would find a whole new series of textbooks being written, and in most school districts that would be true. Some, however, don't have the budget to replace their textbooks in mass, and failed to get government grant money to do so. Highland was one of the districts.

For most textbooks, this wasn't an issue. Math and basic science hadn't changed; neither had social studies. Literature, on the other hand, was vastly changed in the wake of the memetic backlash. Some classics, though proven safe over centuries of school readings, didn't get 'approved' for the new age of literature. These classic were no longer in favor, and some people saw this as a golden opportunity to make those books 'go away'.

All this meant Daria grew up reading about books that she was not 'allowed' to read. Being a natural reader and curious child, this upset Daria greatly. One day when wandering around town, Daria stumbled into the remnants of Highland's tiny library. During the memetic riots the library had been attacked and partially burned. Figuring that the town would never trust books again, the county cut the library's budget in its entirety and the building was abandoned. To young Daria this abandoned building was a treasure trove.

Many of the books in the small library had been destroyed in the riots, and many more were lost to decay and exposure in the years since. Despite this, there were plenty of books for an avid young reader. Things were great, until Daria discovered a load of new books that had been dropped off at the library the day of the riots. Amongst them, a book called "Lessons in Critical Thinking." Daria's life would never be the same.

OoOoOoO


	4. Oversoul

Meta-humans had been an accepted part of the world for almost 50 years, having first been properly documented in the early 1950's. Most 'normal' meta-human powers were essentially parlor tricks that anyone could duplicate with the right gadget; such as someone who could light cigarettes by pushing them against his thumb. While the actual source of meta-human powers was still unknown, it was understood that they were powered through a tiny channel into another dimension.

Oversoul level meta-humans were first discovered five years ago. If normal meta-humans had parlor tricks, Oversouls had powers out of a comic books. The idea of a meta-human that powerful would have eventually blown over but for the one universal fact united all the Oversouls together; they all had a voice in their heads.

Most scientists believed that the sheer power an Oversoul level meta-human could draw on was more than the human mind could handle. Thus each meta created of an energy-based mind, called an Other, to act as a gatekeeper for their powers.

Unfortunately, the public did not take the idea of powerful meta-humans with a literal case of multiple-personality disorder well. Laws had been enacted placing any known Oversoul into Facilities for their 'care and treatment'. Daria was the tenth Oversoul to be identified and the first to enter this particular Facility at the age of 13.

The Facility had once been a psychiatric hospital on several acres of lightly forested land. When the Facility took over the grounds the pragmatic designers realized there was nothing they could do to actually KEEP any of the meta-humans on campus and little had changed. Instead official policy stated that any meta-human who left the grounds would be the recipient of a shoot-on-sight order.

Most analysts believed that when public hysteria calmed down the Oversouls would be allowed back into public. Daria agreed, but at the same time realized that release would not be in her future; her powers ensured that.

One of Daria's therapists had likened her powers to a "wikipeida to the universe." Through her Other Daria could access information that was up-to-date and accurate on anything she could establish a link to. The only know limits to Daria's abilities were the requirement for a starting point and the inability to learn anything that occurred before the detonation of the first atomic bomb.

The government had only approached Daria with request a few times, such as to track down the terrorist ultimately responsible for the New York Trade Center bombings. Otherwise she was being kept away from the public to avoid the questions people didn't want answered.

OoOoOoO

Daria Morgendorffer allowed her eyes to roam the open space that had been designated as their activity area, or at least as much as she could without glasses.

**It was a pretty lousy thing to do, taking our glasses away**, her Other said, **The psych shouldn't have asked if his wife was having an affair if he didn't want to know.**

_That's true._ Daria thought back to her Other, _But at the same time I didn't have to give him the answer; or the details. I should have guessed he'd be petty enough take bad news out on the messenger._

Daria shifted in her Facility issued cotton pants when one of her fellow 'guests' burst into a screaming argument with her personal Oversoul. Of course since only the meta-human in question could hear her Other, the argument seemed very one-sided. The rules of the Facility separated the sexes at all times and separated the dangerous guests from the others. Unfortunately for Daria's piece of mind, the definition of dangerous in the Facility meant the presence of an Oversoul. While the information provided by Daria's Other could be dangerous in the right situations, it wouldn't mean much if the screaming pyrokineticist burst into flames.

_Why are we out here again?_ Daria asked her 'self'. _Normally we don't share yard time with Bursts-into-Flames._

**Part of it is Mr. Wymbie's fault**, Daria's Oversoul replied. **Its part of his revenge for telling him his wife was knocking boots with his sister. The other reason is that Tam's Oversoul. Mr. I-can-See-the-Future himself told us that it would be in our best interest to be out here today. Considering how rarely he speaks to any of the rest of us, it's probably a good idea to follow his advice.**

Daria nodded, and leaned back against the low stone wall her bench had been placed against. Most of her fellow guests avoided Daria in a futile attempt at preventing Daria from knowing everything about them; not that Daria really cared to look.

Daria was shaken from her thoughts by a voice she didn't recognize. "Hey stranger, this seat taken?"

Daria judged the voice to belong to a girl around her own age. Without her glasses, the girl was nothing but a blur, but Daria could tell she was wearing the simple white cotton scrubs issued to all the quests.

"Not at the moment," Daria replied, "But are you sure you want it? I could be pretty dangerous."

"Sure," The voice replied, "But I've been given the 411 on everyone out here and you're probably the safest person out here."

The blur sat down next to Daria and just barely resolved into a black haired girl just slightly taller than Daria herself.

"Careful," Daria warned, "Or I'll know more about you than you do."

"Nah," The blur replies. "We Lanes don't have secrets worth caring about." Then, to Daria's shock, for the first time in almost a year, someone deliberately took her hand.

As the basic information flowed from her Overmind Daria heard the blur say, "The name's Jane, Jane Lane. Nice to meet you."

OoOoOoO

"So," Jane began, "I hear it's a tradition to give your powers and all that when you meet someone the first time, so I'll go first. As I said, my name is Jane Lane and I have superhuman senses."

Daria raised an eyebrow, a trick she picked up to freak out the psychiatrists.

"They must be extreme if you have an Other." Daria commented.

"Well, I can see the whole electromagnetic spectrum and other weird things like taste the color purple and smell thunder. Oh, and if I want to I can do that anyplace in the world without being there. If you gave me a moment I could tell you what color of underwear some random schoolgirl in Japan is wearing right now."

"It's night in Japan right now, Jane."

"Okay, then the color of their pajamas, if they wear any; I'm sure you get the point."

"I do." **Interesting example.** _You stay out of this._ **Not a chance. She's the most interesting thing to happen to us in ages. **_Then could you please keep your comment to yourself at least?_ **No way; I'm going to have way too much fun with this. You have noticed that you're still holding hands, right?**

Daria had noticed that Jane hadn't let go of her hand yet, but Daria's last physical contact with another person had been over four months ago. Daria wasn't sure she could let go of Jane's hand on her own.

"So," Jane asked, "people tell me you are the person in the know . . . . Want to share some info about this place?"

Jane must have felt Daria's muscles tense at the question, because she quickly rephrased.

"I mean the dos and don'ts. At the last facility one of the cafeteria guys was a boob man. If you flashed him a little cleavage you got an extra half scoop of whatever he was in charge of. At the place before that you never wanted to talk football with the guards, because they were always losing money betting on the games. Little tips like that."

Daria felt herself relax as Jane explained herself. **That's a good question.**

"For starters, don't ask Mr. Wymbie about his wife or sister. He's petty and has no problem punishing the messenger." **Even when he asked for the information.**

Daria turned her head and meet the still blurred eyes of her companion. "But the most important think involves your Other. I don't know how well you get along, but do NOT allow the guards to catch you in arguing out-loud."

Daria nodded towards the pyrokinetist who was deeply involved her one-sided screaming match.

"She's going to have double the number of pills in her cup tomorrow, and I'm betting most of them won't be vitamins. Whenever any of the psychiatrists think you're having disagreements with your Other their first impulse is to drug you for a few days to 'cool off' followed by extra therapy sessions."

"And the guards?" Jane asked.

"Most of the visible ones are nice enough. Watch out for the redhead though, he likes to have 'accidents' with cups of water. He'll target anyone with breasts so most of us keep six feet away from him whenever we can." **It's nice to watch though, as long as we're not the targets.**

Daria paused before making her next statement.

"What you have to look out for, are the guards with the black faceplates. They're part of the hunter squads that go after the escapes and the serious trouble makers. The last time they were here one of the other guests, totally harmless guy, got a rifle butt to the head for being in their way. As far as anyone here can determine, 'being in the way' meant 'they saw him'. He'd still be in the infirmary if they hadn't let Jack heal him." **I still say they detoured just so they could hit someone else.**

Jane winced.

"Okay, the storm trooper want-to-bes aren't going on my Christmas card list. But speaking of the infirmary. . . ." Jane drew her legs onto the bench, where she hugged them tightly.

Daria gave their joined hands a firm squeeze.

"Once they've got a good grasp of what you can do all the experimentation is strictly voluntary. The perks for volunteering are nice, but they don't deprive you of the basics if you refuse."

"That's weird," Jane said. "The last Facility I was at was all about experimentation; as complete and through as possible. There wasn't a day that I didn't get painful test or a 'request' to see something for them; often times both."

"This is a long-term holding facility, Jane. That's why it is so comfortable. There are two kinds of Oversouls here: the ones that couldn't be stopped and the ones that the government is scared to let go."

"I'll admit it is a lot swanker here than in any other Facility I've ever been in, but what do you mean by two kinds of people?"

Daria gestured over to the pyrokinetist, who had finally gotten quite, though an occasional rude gesture betrayed her continued agitation.

"Take Annet there. She could walk out of this place anytime she wanted to and there's nothing the hunter squads could do to stop her. It would take a carpet bombing to hurt her and I doubt that could kill her."

Daria sighed and gestured to herself.

"I'm in the prime example of the other category. The questions I could answer and the secrets I could reveal give some people screaming nightmares. Your ability to spy on anyone is the same. They can't allow us out into the general public were someone could ask the 'wrong' questions and get the right answers."

Jane sighed. "I've been watching them draft Bill 23076 for a couple of months now. I thought it looked like they were putting in a few too many exceptions for them to let go of all of us."

Daria nodded.

"We've been keeping track of it ourselves." Daria explained. "And it's been obvious from the start that there are some of us they'd much rather not let into public. About tow months ago they started swapping people in and out. This place is expensive to maintain, but it's more likely to keep the long-timers inside than an actual prison would."

"Having a broken lock doesn't mater if the inmate won't go out the door."

Daria nodded.

**Are you planning on letting go of her hand anytime soon**? _Will you drop that?_ **Not until you admit it.** _Fine, if Jane wants her hand back she's going to have to get it herself. Are happy now?_ **Yes.**

"Hey," Jane gently broke into the mental conversation. "I noticed you seem to be squinting a lot, having eye trouble?"

Daria sighed. "Do you remember my warning about Mr. Wymbie? He's one of the 'expert' headshrinkers here. Yesterday he asked a question he probably shouldn't have and got an answer he didn't want to hear. He invented some psychobabble and got my glasses confiscated. I can't see without them, even you are an almost total blur."

Daria felt Jane's hand tighten in hers. "That asshole! Is there anything you can do to get them back?"

Daria nodded. "He's just a visiting headshrinker. Monday, when my regular psychiatrist comes back, she'll override his decision and give me my glasses. I know the Facility well enough to get around; I'll just have to avoid bumping into anyone until Monday."

"Well, if you need a seeing-eye person in the meantime I'm your girl." Jane laughed.

_Don't._ **Don't what?** _I know what you were about to do, stay out of her info._ **I was just going to check her orientation**. _We don't need to know that._ **Yes we do, but I'll wait until you ask. And you are going to ask.**

"You won't have to twist my arm." Daria said out loud.

Jane sighed theatrically. "Well, there goes the easiest way to lead you around."

Daria laughed. **Oh, I like her.**


	5. In search of the Path

The Seeker smiled as the last Impling feel at her feet. It certainly hadn't been easy blasting her way into this old sorcerer's lair, but it was currently the best lead she had on getting home.

Keeping her trusty arcane pistol ready, its grip worn to the shape of her hand, the Seeker approached what she believed to be the door to the lair's inner sanctum. The metal bound wood doors were unlocked, and opened with surprisingly little effort or noise.

The room turned out to be exactly what the Seeker had learned to expect. Part library, part lab and fancy magic symbols painted on everything. What she hadn't expected was the crouched figure leaning in front of the large chest on one side of the room.

The Seeker had not come all this way to be robbed of the prize. She leveled her pistol at the other intruder. Drawing on all the experience she had gained trapped in this twisted world of sorcery, the Seeker yelled in her most authoritative voice. "Freeze! Hands in where I can see them! Turn around slowly and I won't have to shoot. Oh my god! It can't be!"

The small woman who had been stealing the Seeker's loot stared in surprise. "Brittany Taylor? What the hell are you doing here?" Daria Morgendorffer asked.

OoOoOoOoOoO

Daria Morgendorffer and Others in:

In Search of the Path

OoOoOoOoOoO

Brittany almost relaxed, but suddenly remembered the numerous shape shifters she had run into trying to get home. Daria must have seen Brittany tense back up, because she sighed and kept her hands in the air.

"You know you could ask me questions to identify me." Daria said. "But between the shape shifters, mind readers and illusionists there's no way to know if I really know the answer or if I'm getting it from you somehow. Just take it on faith that I'm the real Daria and shoot me later if I'm lying."

"Well if you are the real Daria, what are you doing here?" Brittany demanded. Brittany moved her arcane pistol to the rest position anyway.

"Probably the same thing you are," Daria replied. "One of my contacts brought up rumors that the sorcerer that made this place was a portal nut. I was investigating to see if that was true."

Brittany sighed and holstered her weapon. "Ok, two more questions. How did you get in here, and have you had any luck?"

"Do you remember what happened before you woke up here?" Daria asked as an opening.

Brittany nodded. "I was on the bus coming home from that trip up the mountain. I must have fallen asleep or something, because the next thing I know there is this old guy telling me I was going to wake up in another world."

"And he told you to choose a 'class' to make surviving easier." Daria took over. "Then told you there were a lot of ways home, but some were more 'expensive' than others. The he wished you luck and you woke up here."

Brittany nodded her agreement. "But what does that have to do with you being _here_?"

Daria sighed. "I wanted to become someone who knew things about this world to make getting home easier. I choose to become a Journeying Scholar. What nobody told me was that Journeying Scholars have more in common Indian Jones or Laura Croft than with a librarian."

"Oh I loved those movies." Brittany said. "That actor was so cute, before he got old at least."

Daria carefully _didn't_ roll her eyes. "Anyway, places like this need air vents to let smoke out at least. Basically; I crawled down the chimney."

"Oh, cool. Listen I don't suppose you can get back out that way could you? And maybe take me with you? I couldn't take some of the guards so I froze them. They _might_ be getting out soon."

Daria shook her head. "I barely fit myself. Unless you can shrink, I don't think you are going to fit."

Brittany snapped a finger. "I knew I should have gotten that shrinking potion."

Daria shrugged. "I don't think I'm going to get out that way either. My packs are a lot larger than they were when I came in. I haven't found anything useful yet, just this last chest to open. The university in Waltz will pay for some of the books I found, but most of them are just common edition junk."

Brittany sighed. "I didn't find anything really good either. This guy had no taste. I kept running into icky demon summoning stuff. I can't sell any of it without getting in trouble. Can you open the chest?"

"I don't know yet. Give me ten minutes?"

As Daria returned to the lock, Brittany asked. "Have you seen anyone else from Lawndale?"

Daria wiggled a pick for a moment before replying. "I ran into Evan about two months ago."

"The guy on the track team? What was he doing?" Brittany asked.

"He was leading a golemiod division for the Empire of Bass."

Brittany looked aghast. "Those assholes? Why?"

Daria shrugged as much as she could with two occupied hands. "He didn't say. I was a bit too busy running from him to have a conversation. He tried to capture me for the bounty Bass has on off-worlders."

With a satisfying click, Daria popped the lock.

OoOoOoO


	6. Monster Madness

In the early 1990's humanity has its first contact with aliens. They weren't friendly. A giant monster descends on Mexico City and all but destroys it before vanishing. A short time later the monster appears again and levels another large city.

The third attack began like the first two, but it didn't end there. The monster had almost half-destroyed Tokyo when a giant robot of alien design descended from the sky and killed it.

They called themselves the Rtisa, and they said they were inter-planetary big game hunters. The monster, which they called a Vigakon, would be the first of many, as their migration route had shifted to pass over Earth. Normally, with their prize in hand, the Rtisa would leave to report it, but they would stay if humanity would pay for their supplies. The governments of the world felt they did not have any choice but to comply.

Within a month, the next monster attacked, and the Rtisa handily beat it off. With two monsters to claim, however, their price for staying went up just a bit.

The pattern would repeat several times with varying frequency over the next year. The Rtisa price has become almost backbreaking for the nations forced to pay, but they still do. Finally the Rtisa ask for what they are really after . . . . They demand a hundred human children for 'food supplies' or humanity would be on its own for the next attack.

OoOoOoO

The Rtisa are a naturally carnivorous species that finds the taste of 'talking food' especially tasty. They grow giant monsters and attack intelligent species with them. They then use the big-game hunter story to demand what they want until they feel their victim will give away anything to be protected, then they start asking for a tribute of the specie's children and goods, or they will destroy their victim.

The Rtisa have run this scam several times over their history. It has worked very well on the herbivores species they have run it, and it has worked well on a handful of the carnivores they have 'conquered' as well.

All of the species the Rtisa have conquered have one thing in common, however. None of them evolved from a naturally tool using species.

This means the Rtisa have never heard the phrase, "Necessity is the mother of invention; but it also has a bastard child, [b][i]reverse engineering[/i][/b]."

OoOoOoO

Humanity's first giant robot was inelegant, crude, and a shameful attempt at copying Rtisa technology, but it is enough to drive of the Rtisa representative before being completely destroyed.

It would only be a mater of time before the Rtisa return with more monsters and more of their own giant robots. The major nations of Earth quickly drafted and signed the Earth Defense Treaty and formed the Giant Robot Defense Force, or the GRDF. The GRDF was given the power to 'requisition' whatever material and manpower they need to defend Earth. They managed not to abuse the power too badly.

OoOoOoO

One day, Daria went to her college clinic to receive a follow-up appointment for a recent bout of the flu. She was meet in the lobby of the clinic by men in the GRDF uniform.

Later that day, the Morgendorffers were informed that their oldest daughter had been drafted into the GRDF. She would only be allowed basic, censured, communication until her first tour of duty was complete. Afterward she would be allowed to resume physical contact with her friends and family.

No one who knew her before saw Daria in person for five years.

OoOoOoO

The GRDF rapidly put together several teams of giant robots. Rtisa technology was/is poorly understood, however, and humanity's attempt to customize it for their own use created some 'quirks' in the new technology.

The most major problem was solved by shaping the new giant robots like animals. Flying vehicles looked like birds, cavalry units resembled fast predators, and the heavy hitters were patterned after large or powerful predators.

The second problem was more difficult. It takes a special person to drive a giant animal-shaped war machine. The machines don't respond equally well to all pilots, and the best responses are sometimes found in the most unlikely people. A medical test was quickly invented to discover who the best pilots will be, and when someone who did well was discovered in the civilian population they were involuntarily drafted into the GRDF.

OoOoOoO

In the meantime, the GRDF was successfully repelling Rtisa attacks. The vast distance of space meant the Rtisa had to be haphazard about their attacks. Attacking only in small numbers as transporting giant robots and monsters was very expensive.

Despite the infrequency of the attacks, however, the North Eastern American GRDF team has seen action several times. Covering the entire North American continent east of Missouri, the Thunder Team has become the model other teams inspire to. This is in thanks in no small part to the team's heavy artillery unit, which resembles the Black Bear.

The team was doing so well in fact, the Rtisa dropped everything they had on it in an attempt to cow the human population.

The Thunder Team did its best, but it was outnumbered by over 3-to-1. One by one, Thunder Team fell. The Rtisa command robot made a great show of destroying the fallen robots' cockpits. Soon only the Black Bear remained.

Cornered, and mostly destroyed, the Black Bear is being restrained by the Rtisa monsters. The master Rtisa gloated over loudspeakers as it stalked over to the last remaining defender.

As if in a rage, the Bear threw off its captors and moved to stand on its back feet for one last stand. As it moved, however, a great ratcheting noise emerged from the machine, and it seemed to fold into itself as the color ran from its broken armor.

Impossibly, what took its feat was not a Black Bear, but a white human-shaped robot! On its chest was the snarling head of the Bear. So stunned was the Rtisa commander at this impossible transformation his defenses were down when this new robot attacked.

The remaining fight was entirely one sided, and after the destruction of one of their most powerful robots, the Rtisa command withdraws the remaining monsters to save them. The white robot threw up its arm in triumph as the Bear's face roared in defiance.

OoOoOoO

Two months later GRDF scientists were no closer to understanding the source of the transformation they were when they started examining it. The Black Bear, now know in the media as the Great White Bear, was simply not constructed to transform. It didn't even have the parts it would need to form a humanoid head!

The pilot was also without a clue about the transformation; but with a little practice, discovered that the Bear could now shift back and forth.

Even more bizarrely, the Bear now acted as if it had a kind of life of its own. It frequently responded to its pilot's moods and 'healed' parts as if it was a living organism.

While the effects for the Bear were spectacular, the GRDF felt that they would have to ground the unit while they studied it. The pilot, while still a member of the GRDF, was given leave to go home with a military aid for company and protection.

OoOoOoO

Two days later, Daria Morgendorffer returned to her parent's home in Lawndale.


	7. Monster Madness Scene 2

This fragments is incomplete, but it represents both the current limits of the story and a decent stopping place.

OoOoOoO

Lieutenant Janice Westthrone, Army Core of Engineers and recently of the GRD, stared at the beginning monologue with all the fascination and horror of an oncoming train wreck. Thankfully, Janice maintained just enough situational awareness to realize her com was going off.

Janice answered the com, and the other side of the line wasted no time on preambles. "What the hell is going on down there? The Bear is growling like crazy and the techies are scared to get anywhere near it."

Recognizing the voice of her commanding officer, General Hinton, Lieutenant Westthorne also dropped all preambles. "Pilot Candidate Sterling has apparently decided not to read his briefing, sir. He called Pilot Morgendorffer a 'know nothing civilian brat', sir."

Janice winced when a particularly vile insult rolled off Pilot Morgendorffer's lips.

"Tell me, Lieutenant. Is the man bleeding?"

"Sir?"

"You heard me, Lieutenant. Is the man physically bleeding?"

Janice glanced over at the vitct . . . Pilot Candidate. "No sir, though I believe his pride has been terminally wounded."

"See these bars?" Pilot Morgendorffer said to the rapidly cowing Pilot Candidate. "These bars are the only thing that matter to Pilots. You get one every time you sortie and engage enemy forces. This bar represents five sorties; they created it for me when I ran out of room on my uniform. I have the second highest engagement count in the whole of the GRD, and I'll be setting the new record by the time you are out of training. [i]If[/i] you don't wash out like the no-nothing newbie that you are. And another thing…"

"As long as the man's still breathing leave it alone Lieutenant. This new generation of candidates always needs to be knocked down a few pegs before we can use them, might as well let Pilot Morgendorffer do some of the work for us."

Janice winced again as Pilot Morgendorffer's furious monologue preceded to tell Pilot Candidate Sterling what he could do to himself. Janice didn't think the act would be physically possible even if Maxwell removed his spine. General Hinton must have heard it through the com as well.

"Lieutenant Westthorne, is Pilot Morgendorffer finished preparing for her leave?" The General asked.

"Yes sir," Janice responded. "All the remains is requisitioning a vehicle and leaving the base. We were on the way to the motor pool when we got called in for an impromptu lecture from 'someone with experience'."

"Good job, Lieutenant." The General said. "I'll alert the motor pool for you and have a Hummer set aside. After Pilot Morgendorffer is done ripping that candidate some new ones, I want you to head to the motor pool and get her the hell off of my base."

Janice contemplated the 3 hour drive she had mapped out to take Pilot Morgendorffer to her parents' home. She also contemplated how long it tookthe normally emotionless pilot to cool off once she had been set off. Janice couldn't prevent the fearful gulp she made before replying. "Yes, sir!"

OoOoOoO


	8. Living Legends

The mysterious military officer, who called introduced himself as Pointman, leaned back in chair.

"You've heard of special forces right? The bet of the best, the elite of the elite? Well, most of them wouldn't cut it with us. Our men and women are living Legends. "

Joanne "Snooper" Carter leaned back in her own stiff military chair. "I'm not sure what intrigues me more Mr. Pointman, the fact that I can hear the capital in legends, or the fact that you are even telling me this in the first place. Should I even be bothering to record this, or should I just hand over my recording equipment now and get it out of the way?"

Pointman laughed. "It would save you some time just to hand it over, but then the guards won't get to have any fun searching you. You aren't quite correct though; this is an interview, but it isn't _my_ interview."

"I'm not military." Joanne pointed out.

"And what part of living Legends included the phrase 'military only'? No, Ms. Carter, my agency recruits from all walks of life, the people we hire only have one requirement."

"That 'living Legends' thing?"

"Seems obvious enough doesn't it? See, amongst the normal human population are people who are, not. Normal that is. Hundreds of names describe them, but they are the people who normal people can only describe by referring to legends. Holmes, Einstein, Lancelot. These are some of the people who were both described and lived as Legends."

"And what does that have to do with me?"

"Two things, Ms. Carter. One, you are what the eggheads call a Spotter. You see things others can't, notice things other won't, and remember every damn bit of it. It's easy enough to prove. What's in the mess hall today?"

"Your man walked me past the mess on the way in. Your menu was a little obvious, Beef Stew and blue jello." Even as she said it Joanne paused for a second."

"But . . . ." Pointman prompted.

"But all I saw was green jello."

"My man watching you told me you looked into the mess for less than a second, and yet here you are an hour later still able to recall the inconsistency."

Joanne snorted. "This isn't something you really need to convince me of you know. I've figured most of this out years ago. No, the real question is, why it is important to you?"

"Tell me Ms Carter, have you ever heard of the Secret War?"

Joanne laughed, "only in comic books. I'm assuming you are refereeing to something a little more real however."

Pointman nodded. "Only too real. Let's just say while Legends aren't common, both sides of a certain curtain had more than plenty of motivation to find every one they could. It evolved into a second cold war, hidden in the first, were both sides fought with Legends. Technology more than a decade ahead of its time, people who could dodge automatic machine gun fire, pilots that were all but literally part of their planes."

A couple of very bad possibilities immediately accrued to Joanne. "Please tell me this cold war ended when the other one did."

"Yes and no. Most of the aspects of the war _did_ end, but amongst other things, the Soviets were in the habit of indoctrinating their agents above and beyond. Some of them don't seem to know, or care, that the war is over. Not to mention all of the suddenly freelance Legends wandering the world. It's become our job to protect ordinary citizens from these rouges."

"And you want to recruit me?"

"Not quite Ms. Carter. See, some Legends can predict people the same way most predict bad fiction. It's harder to do against other Legends, but with enough time it can be done. We spent that time. This isn't a recruitment spiel, this is your 'welcome aboard' introduction."

"So sure of yourselves are you?"

Poitman smiled. "Ms. Carter, there is no way you would miss out at a chance to see history being made. Especially history that most people will never get to see."

Joanne sighed. "Damnit, cornering your prospective is not the best way to recruit somebody. Still, you're right. Where do I sign?"

OoOoOoO

The three months afterward were the most intensive of Joanne's life. But afterward she could consider herself part of the elites and had earned the codename, Blue. While a lot of her training was in ways to best utilize the many facets of her Legend, a lot more had been bent on infiltration, blending in, and unarmed defense.

That time was many years past.

Pointman stood before the assembled team of Legends, a Legend himself as Joanne had discovered. "This is going to be a rough one, team. We aren't going after a low level rouge or freelancer this time, but a fully equipped Secret War sleeper agent."

Several team members, including Joanne herself whistled in shock. Sleeper agents had been used by both sides of the Secret War. Armed with super technology decades more advanced what even most field Legends used, soviet sleeper agents tended towards mass destruction.

With Pointman's permission, an intelligence agent codenamed Thinker took over the briefing.

"Like most sleeper agents, available intelligence on just who the agent was before insertion is pretty much gone. The Soviets handed over most of their sleeper data, but there were some many different departments I don't think even they knew everything that was going on."

"Any ideas about the agents Aspect?"

"Unfortunately, Soviet sleeper agents are heavily indoctrinated with the eye of removing all the normal tells. We know there's one present, but we can't determine who without agents on the field."

Thinker paused before continuing. "About five months ago scanners detected a super tech energy reaction coming from the city for less than a second. The first time was written off as a sensor ghost, but it showed up again two months later, then again last week. The signal was too faded to give us any clues on the nature of the device or devices, but the possibility this was just a leak from some sort of super high energy device can't be discounted."

"Our task," Pointman took over, "is to find and disable any illegal supertech being used in the city of Lawndale. Of course we don't have any projects in the area, so if you find it, it's illegal. In addition, we are to find and neutralize the sleeper agent responsible. The standard secondary goals will be in force, of course. Remember, while we are in friendly territory, we will not be considered friendly agents, take all due caution not to be identified. Since both sides of the Secret War made it a priority to identify each other agents, we won't be using any old school agents in the field, just you new school chumps."

One of the present agents, a huge black man codenamed Rip, laughed. "Well there's new school and there is _too_ new school." Rip turned to look Blue. "Does mommy know what you are doing little girl?"

Blue buried her irritation with long practice. "Open your eyes, ass. If you haven't learned not to take things at face value you're going to get yourself killed."

Pointman interrupted Rip's profane rebuttal. "She's right, Rip. Blue just happens to be the second oldest, second most experienced, and second most capable person in this room. Barring myself, of course."

Blue pointedly ignored Rip and concentrated on Pointman. "I take it will be using my youthful good looks and girlish figure to once again infiltrate a local college?"

Pointman grinned. Blue just prevented herself from swallowing; that grin never heralded good things.

"Not a college," Pointman answered, "high school. We have a couple of associates associated with the program there. You'll be joining them as a teenaged niece that they are temporarily in custody of."

"Roger sir." Blue saluted. "And sir, you suck."

Pointman laughed.

OoOoOoO


	9. Living Legends Part 2

Well I said this was complete, and it is, but TAG's comment has made me think up one more scene. This scene requires that Daria _isn't_ Blue.

TAG, I blame this on you.

OoOoOoO

Thinker glanced up from his electronic notepad. "You wanted to talk to me Blue?"

"Yes," Blue began, "of all the people I have access to, you know the most about rare, tentative, or speculative Legend types. I wanted to pick your brain about a possible Legend not directly related to the mission."

Pointman, who had been speaking to Thinker, was intrigued. "What have you noticed?"

"I was wondering if there were any confirmed distant mind readers or really distant clairvoyant Legends."

Thinker blinked. "Well, there are several confirmed Legends that have an aspect that emulates mind reading. There are also aspects that allow someone to see a couple of miles like they were standing right next to it."

Blue shook her head. "No; we're talking international distances here. In the first example I found it was across the Pacific at least."

Now Thinker was looking truly intrigued. "Maybe you can tell me how the effect manifests?"

"Recently my cover identity had the chance to read a piece of spy-thriller parody by one of the other students." Blue locked eyes with Pointman as she continued. "The actions of the main character were almost a one-to-one match with the events of the Marco mission."

Both Pointman and Thinker straightened to full attention. "The Marco mission is still classified. Are you sure?" Pointman asked.

Blue nodded. "It reads as a very entertaining spy-parody. There aren't any mentions of Legends and other than the Collapser there are no mentions of super-tech either. The main character's thoughts were _way_ off, but her actions correspond almost exactly to my actions during the mission; including some stuff that didn't make in into the reports or debriefings."

Thinker spoke up. "You said it was almost a match; what was different?"

Blue closed her eyes to concentrate. "Whenever I was doing something . . . boring, for lack of a better term, she would put in either a random 'commie' ambush or a seduction scene. Hell, I wish I had gotten laid even half the number of times the heroine did. And I'd have made international news if there were that many deaths in Marco all at once."

"So basically," Thinker said tentatively, "whenever you were doing something that wouldn't make a good story the author . . . kicked it up?"

Blue nodded.

"Is that the only story she has on you?" Pointman asked.

"No, the she said there were more." Blue answered. "We aren't quite close enough for me to just ask myself over to read the others, but she did tell me they were in similar veins."

Thinker tapped his chin. "Well, this is just speculative for now, but it sounds like you have stumbled across a Storyteller."

Both Pointman and Blue raised eyebrows. "I haven't heard of that one," Pointman said, "is it anything like a Bard?"

"Close," Thinker answered, "they could be considered variations on a theme. The Storyteller doesn't have the Bard's compulsion and attention grabbing aspects; but they do have the ability to 'sense' interesting stories from great distances. They have to filter what they 'see' through their own perceptions and knowledge, but supposedly they could pick up on events on the other side of the world."

"And why I haven't heard of these before?" Pointman asked.

Thinker shrugged. "Rarity mostly. Storytellers are really hard to identify, you can never quite be sure if the work of 'fiction' you are reading was researched, 'seen', or just made up. Until you can tell me if the other stories are similar I won't be able to make concert identification."

"Any idea why there are scenes that don't match?" Blue asked.

Thinker shrugged. "For the 'ambushes'; your author was writing spy-parody. You'd expect that sort of thing to be included to make things more interesting." Thinker grinned. "As for the sex . . . your author is a teenaged girl right? I'd blame hormones."

Thinker blinked when Blue snorted. "You disagree?"

"I'm not sure the author has discovered her hormones yet." Blue replied. "Though I suspect that she'll quite the little hellion when she does."

Pointman sighed. "Back to the point people. Blue, try to get a peek at her other works, see if they match up as well. Thinker, put her down as a potential Legend. If we leave town before we've made a positive identification I want a team assigned to check. Can't recruit her until she's of age, but we can't leave a security risk like that just walking around unsupervised."

"Yes sir!" Blue and Thinker saluted.


	10. Guardian Project

The military briefing room was of the standard configuration used by the arm forces the world over. The soldiers, however, were not typical. They were divided into two types, lab coat wearing scientists and obvious military men, all of whom were wearing high-tech armor out of a high budget sci-fi movie. The scientists and soldiers did not mingle, even those standing at the sides of the room.

There was a third category of person in the room, but only one. He was an unassuming figure, despite the light sci-fi jumpsuit. He was could best be described as 'normal'. There would have been the plenty of seats for all present to sit had the man not had a buffer of empty seats two deep in every direction.

Never the less, all snapped to attention when a uniformed general walked in and took place behind the podium.

"At ease men," The general began, "We have a live one this time. And it isn't going to be a pretty one."

The general let the men shift uncomfortably for a moment before continuing.

"This time we're going after an actual Guardian, class unknown."

The soldiers in the room as one glanced, shifted, or otherwise moved their attention to the jump suited man before looking back to the general.

The jump suited man, interjected a single comment. "So they found another one?"

The general's confirming nod was curt. "Exactly. Now, as all of you know the Guardian Project was implemented in the late 1980's as one of the darkest black projects of the cold war. It was supposed to create soldiers with super human abilities on par with the craziest comic. Captain America would have been considered a failure by the Guardian Program's directors."

The general paused to make sure his men were following him. "The machines of the Guardian Project were run 2,000 times before it was terminated. The end result was almost 2.5 billion project with only 100 successes."

One of the armored soldiers spoke up. "You mean 100 super powered grunts who are all…" The solider stopped, eyes sliding to the jump suited man.

"You can say it Major," Jump suit replied, "The project created 100 super-powered soldiers. All of which are ape-shit crazy; every single freaking one of us ticking a time bomb in our own particular way."

The general nodded, "Not the most diplomatic phrasing, but not entirely false either. What was kept from anyone not in the need-to-know was the program was a little more successful than first believed. Just not directly in front of the equipment. In fact, more than 220 Guardians have been found in one state or the other."

The men shifted in a bit in shock, the Guardian was unsurprised.

"In fact," the general continued, "At the moment most of the egg-heads in the know are thinking the equipment worked every damn time. That leaves 780 super powered nut jobs running around who knows where."

"502," The Guardian interrupted, "The other 278 have been accounted for. Most committed suicide, some went nuts and were gunned down without Wakening, and a couple were recruited into the Program after the fact. The classification system for Guardians was designed explicitly for the rouges in fact."

"And every once and a while," He continued, "We pick up one that we think might be active, just not all the way. Those fight back, and if they wake all the way while we're fighting them…."

The General nodded, "Normally full Guardians are handled discreetly, sometimes even covertly. Most of them aren't that much tougher than your average solider. But the longer they stay awake the stronger they get, and we think this one is the early ones."

"Details are sketchy for now, but back in the late 80's the Project was moved to some little shit hole town in Texas. They ran the machine three times there, and then had a little accident that was covered up by a hazardous material release. After the project's side effects were discovered intelligence went over the town with a fine tooth comb. We found one, and only one, Guardian who was taken into the project. We've been tracking down the families that have left the area since and there are only two left."

"Desertion has slowed the search. By now the Guardians would be at least high 4th, possibly 5th, class. Discretion might not be able to take these guys out anymore so we have been authorized to use main force to suppress them. We move out in 4 hours, finish assembling your gear and be waiting for the transport at 0800, we'll finish the briefing in route. Dismissed."

--

I'm not sure which Morgendorffer(s) got the Guardian powers, or even entirely what they are. It almost feels cliché to do Daria and Quinn, but there is potential either way.

To give some consideration to how seriously the military is taking this, the troops are all wearing low-profile power armor similar to what you see in Mass Effect of Sigma Six. Their shotguns are a serious threat to a armored personnel transport at great range, and they have authorization to call down massive air support. They also have a class 3 Guardian along, and those guys think marine companies make nice warm-ups.


	11. Silvered

Stacy Rowe giggled at a comment her new friend's sister made about the movie that had just finished watching. When she had stopped to think about it, Stacy was shocked how quickly she had fallen in with the new girls on campus.

Jane Lane she had already known, but had little to do with because Jane was older. But both of the Morgendorffer sisters had just started school a month ago, and she had become friends with both of them.

It was especially odd seeing how both girls had been rejected for the Fashion Club membership. Daria had been considered, but was then rejected for being a little too muscular and wearing clothing too...rugged for the Fashion Club. Quinn hadn't even been considered, for being both unfashionable in a loose skirt and top, but for being a little too...plump to fit well into fashion, though Stacy would have just called her big boned.

Stacey had caught up to Quinn after class to apologize for Sandi's rude behavior and was surprised to find the whole incident brushed off. "I try not to get mad when people talk about things they don't understand," had been the main comment. Stacy found herself invited over for dinner for making the effort though.

Stacey had been a little surprised to find out that Quinn was cooking and her older sister had invited Jane to eat as well. Their parents weren't home, but that had been explained with a curt sentence about workaholic parents that betrayed a topic better kept away from.

The dynamics of the sisters had been interesting to watch. Daria was clearly in charge, but she seemed to take careful care of her sister. Daria had taken over watching the food unasked while Quinn calmed down after dropping a bottle, for example.

Dinner had been good, but extremely filling. Both Morgendorffer sisters proved to be heavy eaters; with Quinn easily out-pacing the other three eaters combined. Quinn had complained about 'blasted metabolism' while going for her third plate. Daria's humorous reply when she had gone for her second had been along the lines of 'that's why you cook.'

Stacy had a lot of fun, and found herself easily agreeing to a repeat the next week and again the week after. During her third dinner with the Morgendorffers movie tastes slid into the conversation and it was discovered that all present wanted to see a film coming out that weekend. Stacy wanted to see it, but the theater wasn't in the best part of town and she didn't want to go on her own. The quartet rapidly agreed to a late showing, which lead to all four of them walking home after an enjoyable evening.

Everything was going great, until Quinn froze completely in the middle of both step and sentence.

"Wha…" Stacy began, before Daria's arm shooting up stopped her. Stacy had to bite back a sound as almost eight men she had never seen before came out of the alley in front of them.

Time seemed to slow down for Stacy as the largest of the thugs threatened to rob them. It was almost as if she was noticing everything around them. Daria was slowly backup up with her arm still out and low, slowly pushing both Stacy and Jane back, leaving Quinn in front. Quinn was…vibrating in Stacy's mind and strangely enough seemed to be loosing weight right in front of her eyes; the thin layer of fat disappearing as Quinn shifted into a fighting stance.

Even as Daria was dialing 911 on a cell phone the thug's threats switched to something more…sinister. Stacy couldn't stop the whimper of fear that escaped her throat as the thug pulled out a knife to illustrate his point.

"Quinn **stop!"** Daria yelled beside her. Stacy blinked and saw that Quinn was no longer standing in front of them, but instead was holding the thug's knife arm with one arm, her foot quivering an inch from the side of his head.

"Evaluate rule 4," Daria demanded as Quinn lowered her foot to the ground, the other thugs stunned into immobility by the instantaneous movement.

"He has a weapon, and he is threatening family with significant harm." Quinn's voice was flat and monotone, dreadful in its emptiness.

"He pulled a weapon," Daria argued, "But he hasn't threatened us with it. He's also just stated robbery, not rape. That doesn't mean dead, just…"

"Broken," Quinn interrupts with a ghost of a smile. And with a move almost too quick to see, the thug's arm breaks with an audible snap and scream. This is too much for one thug, who begins to run. He gets three steps before being knocked unconscious by a blow from a too-impossibly-fast-to-follow Quinn.

"Pull a gun," Daria yells as the thugs begin to scatter, "And there is nothing I can do to stop her from killing you **ALL!**"

The single thug still conscious sobs in relief as the sirens for approaching police vehicles start growing louder.

Stacy stares at what remains of a small gang in shock. "What have I gotten myself into?" she thinks, as the cops hastily spill from their cars.

The police had been very harsh with her for the first few minutes of the interview after the…incident. Then the chief of police had entered the room they were keeping her and let her go without a fuss. He only asked that she talk to Quinn's "keeper" before she talked to anyone else. She had very reluctantly asked Quinn who she should talk to about the incident.

With an exaggerated sigh Daria raised her hand, "That would be me."

The Morgendorffer sisters put off all attempts at questions. An argument broke out between Daria and Jane that resulted in an impromptu sleepover. Stacy could see Jane's point, after an evening like this the chance of the Morgendorffer house being empty the next day seemed likely.

After a fitful nights rest and a warm breakfast, cooked by Quinn, the quartet retired to the Morgendorffer living room for 'story time'. Stacy Rowe sat on the couch, nursing a cup of hot coffee. Stacy wasn't a coffee drinker, but in this case she probably needed it.

"Before we begin," Daria started, "We should make sure we're all on the same page. Tell me what you saw last night."

"What I saw," Jane mutter with a little bit of anger, "Was a bunch of out-of-town thugs getting ready to rob, beat and rape us. Then Quinn goes Jet Li on the boss and you stop her from kicking him in the head. Then she breaks his arm like I'd break a potato and beats the rest of the thugs unconscious before I could blink. The cops show up, take us to the station, and then let us go without the slightest fuss."

"About the same," Stacy says when prompted, "It seems strange now, but I thought Quinn looked…thinner when she was doing it and she stayed thin until this morning."

"Wow," Quinn muttered, "First time someone caught that without prompting."

Daria rolled her eyes. "Ok to make it simple, thanks to a great handful of idiots Quinn got entangled in a secret government program which has left her with a number of side effects, some of which are more unpleasant than others."

Daria paused to take a sip of her coffee, "The idea was to create a method of turning a raw recruit into an effective soldier as rapidly as possible. The first method that seemed to work involved these microrobots in the form of a silver powder. They were only supposed to be temporary, but you could make more on the field with the right tools. A soldier testing the prototype took a tiny amount of one dose away from the testing center. Then he bought the right tools."

"Wait, he got away with that?" Jane interrupts, "And you're allowed to tell us?"

"By the time anyone found out, he'd already given some, and the trick of making more, to his street gang back home. Now you can find Silver in almost in large city in America if you know who to talk to. The government's letting varying agencies know about the leak, but through some sort of PR miracle, has kept it from the general public. It isn't really classified anymore, you're just told not to talk about it unless you have to."

"How did you get into that stuff?" Stacy asked Quinn, only half wanting to know the answer.

"Remember those idiots Daria was talking about," Quinn stated flatly, "Well Highland, our old town, had more than its fair share. Two of them, Bevis and Butthead, decided to head to Huston to become 'gangsters'. Some idiot gave them some Silver to run across town. They make it about halfway across town before getting distracted by something and getting bored of the whole thing."

"Then those two _**mutton heads**_," Daria takes over, score dripping from every syllable, "Come back to Highland with half a million dollars in illegal street Silver that they had forgotten all about. One ****ing week later they remember they still have it. They have a panic attack and decide to 'dump' it on someone else until the 'heat' dies down."

Daria snorts, "Apparently I had made some sort of impression on the idiots. I was the 'smartest chick they knew. We're walking back from school when they come running up out of the blue. They're yelling about how the 'mob' is after them. I'm brushing them off, when a black car passes nearby. Butthead panics and throws a brown paper bag at me. I knocked it out of the air with my books, but the bag breaks open and hits Quinn in the face."

Quinn takes over, "Three days later I wake up in a military hospital like this. They tell me I'm not the youngest to ever get O.D. on Silver, but I am the youngest to ever get O.D. all at once. Normally they have a special school over kids that got accidently Silvered like me; but while mom isn't much of a mother now she's still a kickass lawyer. She springs me and a year later move down here."

"So," Jane interjects, "What does being 'Silvered' mean?"

"Silver has two modes," Daria answered, "Active and Passive. When it's in passive mode the Silver moves out into the fatty tissue under the skin as if was in storage, it makes Quinn a lot tougher than normal, but she can't use the Silver for anything else."

"It also," Quinn interrupts angrily, "Makes me look fat."

Daria nods, "One of the unpleasant side effects is Quinn needs about 4,000 calories a day just to maintain her weight in Passive mode. That's twice what a normal adult eats. The microbots aren't picky eaters, but they are voracious." Daria explains to the confused looks.

"In active mode, the Silver moves into her body. She gets super strength, speed, agility, the works. It also starts up a kind of autopilot; a fully trained super-soldier that will do whatever needs to be done without remorse, at least until it shuts down."

Stacy catches on first, eyes widening a second before Jane's. "Last night, when Quinn was kicking that guy in the head…"

Daria nods reluctantly and Quinn looks firmly at the floor. "A full power kick from the Silver? He wouldn't have stood a chance."

"And what do your parents, who I still haven't meet, think about this?" Jane asks.

Quinn jumps to her feet and begins to pace, "I'll tell you what they think; they don't, that's what they think. Don't interrupt me Daria. Ever since mom started pulling strings to get me out of the hospital they both been around less and less. Since we moved to Lawndale I've probably seen them less than 10 times! **** it I probably needed that **** hospital. If they hadn't figured out what was going to happen and taught Daria how to stop me I would have killed every ****ing one of those ***holes last night!"

As Quinn's rant becomes angrier and louder, Daria puts her fingers to her mouth and whistles loudly. Quinn flinches at the noise and then glares at Daria, but stops ranting.

"The hospital gave me some papers full of suggestions to help Quinn and I have constant e-mail correspondence with experts. As long as we stay out of life-threatening situations and stay **calm**." Daria throws a little glare at her sister, who sits back down, "Quinn is just like every other girl; just a little bit stronger and faster, with a bit of a temper. If it really comes down to it I have something that can stop the Silver in full rampage, but I'd rather not have to."

"So let me see if I get this straight," Jane begins, "The two village idiots accidently turn your sister into a super-soldier. Your parents are basically left her to you and almost sleep at work. You're doing the best you can, but sometimes the soldier slips the leash a little." Daria nods a little and Quinn closes her eyes against the coming rejection. "Sounds fine to me, what's for lunch?"

Both Morgendorffer sisters stare at Jane in opened mouthed shock. While they do, Stacy gathers her courage and clears her throat.

"I'll admit Quinn, I'm a little scared of you. I don't want to be, but hey I'm a little scared of everything. You remember Sandi right? Well, I'm more scared of her than I am of you and I'm still friends with her. So…want to be friends."

Stacy watches the hope bloom in Quinn's eyes. She isn't sure what she is getting into, but she is certain that nothing will be the same.

OoOoOoOoOoO

I am much better at story fragments, scenes, and details than full fledged stories, so I am going to stop here.

Honestly this is about as far as this idea went anyway. Originally I was going to have Daria be the super-soldier, but I felt I was beginning to pick on her a bit, so I switched targets. Somehow the idea of a super-soldier as the least suspected person appeals to me.

Why Stacy? With a little bit more spine she is the most personable of Quinn's class, and I thought Quinn deserved some sort of break.


	12. Personable Computing

I almost feel ashamed for thinking of this, but the cuteness won't go away.

--

The Japanese love to personify things. Animals, spirits, things, etc. You name if, the Japanesse have some sort of fiction involving a personified version of it. One of the examples of this is Clamp's manga/anime Chobits.

Chobits personifies computers. In it there exists Peronscoms. They are basically personal computers in fully mobile humanoid cases. These aren't androids, that's different, theses are computers given a humanoid from.

There are even 'laptops' which are six-inch tall fully mobile humanoid computers.

--

As an only child, Quinn Morgendorffer was used to getting what she wanted. When she was 14 and living in Highland she asked her parents for her own Personcom. One day, her father came home with a little laptop sized Personcom. Quinn's father had recommended she name the little machine Daria. Quinn isn't sure where her father got Daria, but the tiny little computer he got her was not exactly what she had in mind.

For one thing, it came with this ugly outfit involving a green jacket and orange shirt. Quinn also questioned the sanity of anyone who would put a Personcom in boots and glasses; whoever did must have also been the person to program the little Personcom to be as stubborn as a mule. Whenever Quinn tried to change Daria's outfit the little laptop would wait until Quinn's back was turned and then change back her original outfit, even if that mean going into a trashcan to retrieve it. Daria's deadpan speech and voice were also an annoyance to her owner; but the only other voice the Personcom had grated Quinn's nerves even worse.

Still, when she was feeling generous Quinn admitted that her little computer's stubbornness was about the only thing that kept her out of summer school last year. Daria had a knack for repeating lessons in a way that made more sense than Quinn's textbooks and the computer could really dig her heels in when it was study time.

Daria also made an excellent Bevis and Butt-Head repellant. The two idiots had attempted to steal Daria from her once, but after an hour the badly scuffed duo returned her unharmed to Quinn. Ever since, whenever the two idiots caught sight of the Personcom they would turn and run from the computer that could stand in the palm of their hand.

snip

The things I wrote above where purely background for this scene below which is what triggered this whole bunny in the first place.

snip

"Thanks for inviting me over Stacy." Quinn said, as she crossed the threshold into her first Lawndaleian friend's house.

Stacy smiled. "It's you doing me the favor. Sandi may say too much studying isn't fashionable, but summer school would be so much worse."

"Well we can't have that." Quinn smiled. "And if you can put up with my study aid we'll see if we can get you into the more fashionable B range."

"Study partner?"

Quinn nodded, and unzipped her duffle bag. Without prompting, Daria stuck her head out of the bag.

"That is a really undignified way to travel." The six-inch computer complained.

"Oh wow, you have a Personcom too!" Stacy exclaimed, bouncing in place.

"Too?" Quinn asked.

Stacy nodded, "My mother got me a laptop last month. She's been a big help in keeping my schedule, but she isn't very good at explaining things."

"Daria's pretty good at explaining things," Quinn said, "But she can get pretty grumpy sometimes."

Stacy giggled. "Well I bet your Persocom doesn't draw on every lose piece of paper she finds." Stacy opened the door to her room and pointed at her desk. "See?"

Standing on the desk, a six and a half inch Personcom was holding an ink stained piece of paper larger than she was. The little computer wore a red jacket and shorts and was studying the paper intently.

Without looking up from the paper, the Personcom addressed her owner. "Don't worry. It's the same one as last time. What do you see?"

Stacy sighed, but did as her computer asked. "I see two people talking, Jane. Just like the last time. I want you to meet my new friend, Quinn."

The little machine looked up at the new person a smiled. Changing positions, the computer held up the piece of paper with an ink blot on it. "And what do you see?"

Quinn glanced at the piece of paper, but before she could agree with Stacy's opinion, Daria spoke up from the duffle bag. "I see a herd of ponies running free across the plains."

Jane shot her owner a look that just screamed 'I told you so' and Stacy groaned.

Daria grinned a knowing little smile, and Quinn realized that having these little computers meet might not have been in their owners' best interests.


	13. Death's Avatar

This idea borrows pretty heavily from Bleach for the truth of the world, but I think I have enough differences to make it interesting.

/////

Once, in a time before time mattered, all things shared one soul, an omni-soul

Then, for causes unknown, the omni-soul was shattered into a near-infinite number of pieces. The largest piece of the omni-soul was the only thing to retain knowledge of what once was. Its self inflicted task is to reassemble the omni-soul from its shards. This near-eternal task is like building a giant jigsaw puzzle.

The human name for this entity is **Death**.

/////

Even Death has rules however. The greatest of these is that Death can not collect any soul-shard that still has living energy attached to it. This is a problem in some species with 'loose' life force, such as humans, when a separating soul–shard grabs enough life force to prevent it from being collected from Death.

Humans call these bodiless soul-shards ghosts.

Some ghosts are completely harmless and without the ability to make their own life energy they slowly exhaust what they grabbed in death and fade away. Some ghosts, however, cling to their existence more stubbornly, and discover they can take life force from other living things to extend their own existence.

Unable to collect theses ghost, but also unable to interact with the living, Death approached some human ghosts and tasked them with taking the life force of other ghosts so that Death could collect them. Over time these ghosts recruited more ghosts, and they began referring to themselves as Reapers. The Reapers worked well for several thousand years, but over time they slowly became corrupted by what they perceived as their place in the world.

Now the Reapers stand almost useless, only hunting other ghosts when they become strong enough to be 'worth' the Reapers' time. They indirectly prey on humanity by directing ghosts to appropriate victims to 'fatten them up.'

Death realizes a replacement for the Reapers is necessary. It takes several centuries, but it stumbles across an idea after moving to collect the soul-shards involved in a major accident. It notices that some of the shards slip out of its 'fingers' but don't become ghosts, instead the shards return to their original bodies and continue living. Death has discovered artificial resuscitation.

Death runs several tests; but discovers even if it speaks the shards of someone who is resuscitated they do not remember the conversation once they are revived. Death then stumbles on the idea of creating a link between the soul of the revived and its own by doing something that should be anthem to its nature. Death would find a human soul that would fit to Death's own, break a piece of its own soul off, and attach it to the human soul-shard as it reenters the human's body.

Finally it finds a soul-shard that would work and is being resuscitated after being accidentally electrocuted by two idiots. That soul belongs to a body called Daria Morgendorffer.

It grabs Daria's soul as it returns to her body and leaves a piece of its own soul attached.

As Daria recovers in the hospital she just narrowly avoids psychiatric counseling when she starts talking to a 'doctor' no one else can see.

/////////////

Daria's link to Death allows it to manifest in her consciousness. Since Death has no true form Daria's mind takes an image from her memory at random and assigns it to Death as an avatar every time it communicates with her.

Death manages to talk Daria into helping it put down ghosts. Daria is taught how to drain the stolen life force out of ghosts like Reapers do.

After nearly being killed by a ghost that fought back, Daria learned the trick of shaping her own life force into a weapon. Normally this manifests as a gun. (This makes her distinctly different than the Reapers, who usually form swords.)

Unfortunately, the Reapers have forgotten their origin and attack the living human they see as horning into their territory. Under attack by a Reaper more powerful than every ghost she had ever released added together Daria discovers her greatest power.

Daria can pull Death into her body through their bond, temporarily turning herself into Death Incarnate. This manifests as a grey cloak, huge great scythe, and a frightening voice. This also pulls all the ghosts within a mile onto the physical plane, making them visible, and solid, to all. (The manifestations are pulled from Daria's subconscious.) Daria's scythe is perfectly capable of affecting the living and the dead, and it obliterates the attacking Reaper on contact.

//////

Shortly after the attack, during which Daria and the Reaper leveled a block of Highland, Helen accepts a job in Lawndale out of desperation. This is actually a step down for her, employment wise, but she badly wants to get her daughters away from the strangeness that she notices in Highland, never realizing that one of her own daughters was the source.

Now Daria has a new territory to clean, but it is a dangerous one, as Lawndale is the stomping ground of several powerful ghosts and the Reapers that stalk them. Only her little sister has any idea what she has become, a defender of the living from the dead…

**Death's Avatar.**

* * *

Quinn sat gingerly on her sister's bed, trying to hide a wince at the sling on her sister's arm. "So...Is it going to get better or worse once we've moved?"

Daria raised a single eyebrow, a trick that normally drove Quinn nuts. "Do you really want to know?"

Quinn reluctantly nodded, "If there's going to be another, incident, like Sunny Oakes I want to know."

Daria winced, and shifted in remembered pain. "Shady Oakes. That was a unique incident. I personally hope nothing like that ever happens again."

"I thought you always fought like that? And you still haven't really explained what that was."

Daria sighed, "I've explained it to you before Quinn, and that was the first time the fighting was like that. Ever."

"Then explain it again! Explain it so I'll understand what the hell is going on!"

Quinn watched as her sister deliberately looked away from her. Daria had told her she was talking with Death, but Quinn wasn't too sure about that. On the other hand the giant scythe and cowl that had appeared just before her sister leveled the Shady Oakes sub development had been very real. Quinn had spent most of the last month healing up from the flash burns she had received in the explosion.

"Ok, we'll start from the beginning; again. You believe in Death right, the Grim Reaper?"

"Well, sort of, but didn't you say that wasn't true?"

Daria nodded at Quinn and looked at the ceiling, "Well in most movies Death's a bad guy right? 'He' causes people to die." At Quinn's nod Daria continued, "That's not true. People die because they die, Death doesn't kill people. Death comes AFTER you die and takes your soul."

"To heaven right?"

"If you want to think of it that way." Daria grimaced, "The truth's more complicated, but it's not important right now. Sometimes though something strange happens; or the soul doesn't want to go on. In those cases the soul gathers energy from other living things nearby, or the energy that was freed from its own death. This prevents Death from collecting the soul like it is supposed to."

"That's a ghost right?"

Daria grinned at her sister, "I see you were listening last time. Yes, they become ghosts. Ghosts aren't alive anymore, they don't make their own life force. In the natural order of things they'll eventually run out of the energy they started with. When they do Death will be waiting."

Daria held up a finger. "But sometimes, a ghost finds a way to keep going. Some of them do it by hanging out where lots people are and soaking in the energy they give off. Ghosts like this aren't very powerful; most are like the 'ghosts' you see in tourist traps."

"Like the Ghost of _____?"

"Exactly like." Daria confirmed, "Some ghosts are more hostile about it. They attack people and drain them of their energy. Death says the best thing to call these ghosts is ghouls. Some ghouls just drain a little bit, but many kill their victims."

Quinn looks at Daria in shock, "But if Death is real, why doesn't he do something about it?"

Daria looks to her left, clearly startled by something. She then laughs at the unheard comment. "Ok," Daria continues after she has recovered, "In all seriousness, ghosts are a loophole in Death's rules. As long as they have life force it doesn't matter that they stole it, Death can't touch them. That's where reapers come in."

Quinn watches as Daria's face takes on a pensive cast. "Reapers are technically ghosts that attack and steal the energy from other ghosts. Death taught the first reapers how to do it so they could take out the ghosts Death couldn't touch."

"Something went wrong, didn't it?"

Daria nods, "After a while Reapers stopped attacking every ghost they ran across, instead they started…raising them, for want of a better term. They're like cattle ranchers now. They wait until the 'cow' can get nice and fat, and then slaughter it for its meat. The problem is that the 'cows' eat people."

"Ok I get that; I guess, but what does that have to do with you? You called that thing you were fighting a Reaper, but they only kill ghosts. You're alive…Aren't you?"

"I am now. Remember that time Bevis zapped me with a stun gun last year?" Daria waited for Quinn's confirmation before continuing. "Well; the hospital didn't tell Mom, but I crashed while the ambulance was taking me to the hospital. For almost a minute and a half I was dead."

"WHAT!!!!"

"Ssshh! Do you want to call Mom down on us? Its ok, I got better. However, while I was dead I had a chance to talk to Death."

Quinn cocked her head, half believing her sister might be telling the truth. "What did he say?"

A small smile came to Daria's face. "Death gave me the whole story, including the parts I haven't told you. It talked me into helping him with an experiment. I guess you could say Death is quite an effective convincer."

"Experiment?"

"Death was going to make new kind of reaper; one that was living human instead of the ghost of one. I was told to go around cleaning up the weak little ghosts the reapers were ignoring. It wasn't even supposed to be dangerous, just stomping the little tourist-trap ghosts that wouldn't fight back. Then one did fight back and I had to learn how to defend myself."

Quinn looked at Daria in dawning comprehension, "It snowballed did it?"

Daria nodded, "Before too long I had released a lot of ghosts. I was taking their stolen life force and storing it inside myself. That made me a juicy target for the ghouls. Soon they were coming to me. Each one I took out made me even more attractive to the stronger ones."

Daria took a moment to take a sip from the water glass on her desk. "I started performing preemptive attacks, hunting and releasing ghouls at times of my own choosing. I've cleaned out almost every ghoul and ghost within a hundred miles of our house. That's when the reaper showed up."

"That guy at Shady Oakes?"

"That's the one. He was farming the area around Highland and was pissed I was releasing all the ghosts. He came to kill me."

Quinn's eyes widened in horror, "Kill you?!"

"Yes. He would have too, but something weird happened."

"That giant scythe and cape right? I saw it when I caught up with you."

Daria's nod was harder this time. "By the way; I have told you off for following me right?"

Quinn broke eye contact with her sister. "I wanted to know what you were doing sneaking out like that. I thought it might have been a boy or something like that. I was going to get you in trouble with Mom and Dad."

"And it nearly got you killed!" Daria almost yelled at her sister. "Sorry. Sorry, still a sore point I guess. We didn't figure this out until later, but the link that lets me 'see' Death did more. When that scythe came into existence became more than Daria Morgendorffer, teenager. For a couple seconds there I was Daria Morgendorffer, Death Incarnate. It was a little too much for me to handle."

"A little! You destroyed almost four blocks of new houses! They said it was over a million dollars in damages!"

"Hey," Daria protested, "Let's see how well you channel Death Incarnate!"

"They finally declared it a gas leak last week you know?"

"Figures," Daria snorted, "I'm surprised they didn't claim Bevis and Butthead did it."

Quinn grinned. "I think the cops wanted to, but they were both in jail for disturbing the peace when it happened."

"Great, the one time I really needed them as scapegoats they're already in trouble. I'm glad Mom bought our story, for a second there I thought the psych ward was the BEST thing that would happen. Thanks for the cover."

"Consider it payback for saving my life. Let's never mention it again ok? I'm going to have enough nightmares without thinking about **that**."

"Agreed. Going back to the original question; it's going to be worse when we get to Lawndale, at least until I've released the small fry. What happens after that depends on what the…'nightlife' is like."

///////


	14. Of Contracts

Young Daria is at Camp Grizzly. One day she is walking along a trail and a sound makes her looks up to discover a huge rockslide is heading towards her. Just before the rocks reach her, they stop in mid-air.

--

Daria stared up at the rocks, which seem to have stopped completely. A state almost like shock settles on her. Daria is startled when a voice she does not recognize speaks from behind her.

"Well this is a shock. I take a meditation break and decide to investigate an open contract pulse. And what do I discover, but a young lady who's just used the contract phase to delay her own death."

The voice sounds like it belongs to a middle aged woman, but when Daria tries to turn to see, she discovers that for some reason she cannot move at all. At the same time, a tiny little voice speaks up from deep within Daria's mind. _Falsehood_.

"Oh dear. You **are** new at this. You've accelerated your own time-reference dear so you can choose a contract with a Beast. You can talk and think faster than the rocks can fall, but you can't move your body at all. You may call me Abbot dear, and I can tell you what's happening."

_Falsehood._ The voice quietly whispers in Daria's mind. It was like trying to talk through molasses, but Daria managed to grind out, "Go on."

"What's happening dear is called a Contract Phase. It's when Contractors like ourselves open the door for a Beast Contract for the first time. Time speeds up for you so you can choose a Beast without pressure; well as much pressure."

_Truth._"Beasts?"

"Good question. Beasts are powerful supernatural sprits, fragments of some forgotten spirits from the ancient past. Contractors can use the contracts to pull those Beasts partly into this world to do things for use. The contracts were negotiated ages ago to allow Contractors to call on the Beasts without having to argue a new payment each time."

_Truth._ The voice whispered again. "Contract?"

The female voice becomes even more lecturing. "A long time ago, ancient Shamans summoned powerful Beasts to perform tasks for them. They involved everything from grand miracles to mundane tasks. Every time they called forth a Beast, however, the price the Beast wanted for its effort changed. The price went up rather sharply when the Shaman really needed something done; sometimes it was more than they could pay.

"The greatest of the Shamans got together and came up with a new idea, a series of universal contracts that would average out the costs of summoning the Beasts. The Beasts agreed and that's how the Contractors came to be."

_Truth as she knows it. _Daria struggled hard through the slowness and managed to get out, "Help me?"

"Yes dear, I can introduce you to the Beasts you seem to have attracted and tell you their price and abilities faster then they can. Showing new Contractors the ropes is part of what a Contractor does. Every successful Contractor out there reduces the price for all the rest of us. I'll show you the Beasts you have attracted."

A series of images float into the space in front of Daria's eyes. They were fantastical creatures but they seemed almost…kiddy… to Daria's eyes.

_Falsehood. _ The voice whispered, and something else appeared at the edges of Daria's vision. This Beast was also fantastic, but was very different. Instead of looking cutesy and kiddy it had the appearance of a featureless woman wearing a long dress. Wherever the figure would have a joint there was empty space instead. The figure's stick-like arms floated free of its body as if they were additions rather than original parts.

"You were mediating?" Daria asked, focusing on the additional figure and trying to tune out the kiddy beasts floating in front of her vision.

"Oh yes, I find it beneficial to take a couple of hours out of every day to meditate. It was pure coincidence I was close enough to come help you."

Daria didn't need the Beast's whispered, _Falsehood_, to know that she was being lied to.

"How do I call one?"

"You've already chosen?" The woman sounded surprised, "I've only shown you about half of them, are you sure? Your first calling doesn't lock you into anything, but your first Beast is always special. Well you seem certain. Focus on the image of the Beast you want to call and concentrate on it, the Contract trigger should come to you and you say it out loud."

Daria would have nodded if she could have and began to concentrate on the Beast she saw in the distance. As she did words flowed through her mind and out of her mouth.

**Beast of Wisdom and Magic**

**Seer of the Future and the Truth**

**Power that exist out of sight and mind**

"*** that's a real Contract!"

**I give my body over to you that we may walk together in this world**

"You're supposed to summon one the minors you little bitch!"

**I give you my mind so that you can know my desires**

"Damn you, you're supposed to be easy prey!"

**Give me your form so that I have the tools I require**

**Give me your power so that my desires can be fulfilled**

"****, that's not the normal contract. What are you doing you ****** ****?!"

**Come to me**

**I'm right here**

**Be one with me **

_**Fidchell**_

A terrible and glorious sound fills Daria's ears, then a soundless explosion, before everything goes dark.

--

What happened? Abbot represents some of the worst of Contractors; she has allied with a single Beast and boosts its powers by 'eating' the energy of other Beasts. Normally Beasts can't interact with each other, but while operating under a contract, they are vulnerable to each other. She sets up potential Contractors in life-and-death circumstances forces the new Contractor into picking a minor Beast, then attacks and eats it, killing the Contractor in the process. Daria upsets when the Beast that comes to her first turns out to be a Greater Beast, one of the most powerful Beasts known to man. The resulting fight is entirely one sided, but not in the way Abbot wanted it to be.

There are two versions of a contract, the simple version is like a summon. The called Beast enters the world physically and does what you assigned it to. The other style, much rarer, is one where the physical body of the Contractor disappears and is replaced by the Beast. The Contractor directly controls the Beast, but the Beast's 'instincts' are still in play. Daria can do both.

Now the Beasts are constantly flocking to her, particularly the powerful ones like Fidchell. She's entered a 'world' of supernatural powers and brutal rivalries with powerful monsters at her command.

/////////////////


	15. The Advocate

The universe really is as cold and uncaring as 'realists' believe.

Things aren't hopeless however. Every species has powerful entities called Advocates to bend the paths of random chance to a more favorable outcome.

For reasons she is keeping close to her insubstantial chest, the human Advocate called Daria is hanging out at Lawndale High School. By pure cosmic coincidence, Jane Lane has the rare twist of genetics that lets her see and hear Advocates.

Jane had been shocked to discover the being's presence on school grounds when she started her freshman year. Jane thought she was seeing things for several days before trying to talk to the spirit. Shaped like a human girl Jane's own age, and clad in lose flowing robes that would be impossible had they been made out of real material, Jane believes she is the only one on campus that can see the spirit.

The spirit, not a ghost and not an angel, was pragmatic about Jane's ability to see and hear her. It was the beginning of an odd friendship. Below is a little snippet of how Jane's own world is expanded by her odd friendship with one of the universe's most powerful beings.

Jane Lane walked morosely down the corridor after the school wide 'mandatory' memorial for Tommy Sherman. As she had expected, the memorial glossed over almost everything about Tommy, leaving only that he played football for the glory of Lawndale.

She walked casually up to her locker, but checked to make sure she was alone before speaking to the open air. "Did you have something to do with this?"

Floating majestically, but invisibly, beside her locker the spirit responded. "Yes."

"Why?" Jane asked.

"Target of opportunity," the Daria shrugged, "Events lined up so that killing him now would be easier than it will be at anytime during the next four years."

"I you said you where some sort of 'Advocate of Humanity', what did Humanity against Tommy Sherman?"

Daria raised a finger, "There was an 80% chance he would set off World War III five years from now."

"WHAT!"

"The idiot gets into a drunk-driving accident with a truck carrying illegal hazardous materials just outside of Washington D.C. The resulting explosion wipes out Congress and the White House. In the confusion a couple of rouge nations attack the US and general war breaks out when America's allies respond. That starts World War III. Three years after it starts the remnants of humanity are picking through the rubble, slowly going extinct."

"Wow," Jane mussed, "Who would have thought killing a football jock would prevent World War III?"

The insubstantial spirit slowly shakes her head, "Not prevent Jane; Delay. Humanity needs World War III. Without it the technologies needed to beat off the first wave of Machinations would not exist. However, the optimum place to start WWIII for maximum gain and a minimum loss is twenty years from now, not five."

"…Okay…Moving on. Why did you kill him like that?"

The Advocate grinned a quiet little smile. "The universe might not be ironic Jane, but I am."


	16. A Game Most Divine

Daria's Game of Divinity

I've been reading a lot of 'Loop' stories lately. Stories based around the idea from Groundhogs Day, the main characters live life over and over again. I decided to have some fun with it, and borrowed another concept which is readable below.

OoOoOoOoOoO

When Daria opened her eyes, she found herself in a most peculiar room. There were no walls and everything was white. Daria was dressed in white slacks and a colorless t-shirt, which had NOT been what she went to bed in. The only spot of color in the room, besides Daria's own skin, came from the brown wood chair on which she sat.

"Oh god, not again." Daria said out loud.

Suddenly the vastness was intruded on, and with nothing else changing, a modern oak desk now sat in front of her. Behind the desk, on an identical chair to Daria's own, an elderly man dressed entirely in white sat. A white stick stuck out of his beardless mouth.

"Yes, me again," The figure said.

"How did I die?" Daria asked. "I thought everything was going ok; for a completely screw-ball run at least."

The man pulled the stick out of his mouth, revealing it to be a red lollipop. "Crime of passion. You shouldn't have slept with that last man. The man had a wife. The wife had a shotgun."

Daria shrugged. "I did set to get killed that way. I just wish the last sex had been better. How'd I do?"

The old man laughed and handed over a piece of paper that spontaneously appeared in his hand. "Well if you were setting out to get your lowest score ever you failed rather spectacularly."

Daria looked at the paper in shock. "What! I slept with every non-related male I could find. Heck, I went out of my way to create as much havoc as I could."

"And in a lot of ways you did, but some of that havoc did break up some old status-quos."

Daria read the page with great interest. "I got 500 points for sleeping with _Mack?_ It broke Mack and Jodie up. Jodie never spoke to me again and her grades plummeted. Mack quit the football team and ran from me for the rest of high school."

The man nodded. "And after they got over it they both lead better lives. No offense to Michael, but he rolled over a little too easily for Jodie's well being. Instead of going full tilt and burning out at twenty-five Jodie takes it more easily and ends up happily married, not to mention America's first female African-American president. Mack left playing sports for sports therapy and was instrumental in finding a long term treatment for arthritis."

Still perusing the list Daria commented, "I can see how sleeping with Upchuck would provide points, but in light of Mack, why are they so low?"

"The new and confident Charles was a good thing," Came the response, "but he missed out on his optimal match because he overlooked her. Normally she's almost a default; it's hard for you to make big enough changes to prevent their meeting."

Daria smiled, "I guess I managed it that time. Still, I wouldn't mind trying him on again. With a little practice, he could be the best lover ever."

"Your family score was about the same." The old man continued as if the comment hadn't been made. "You weren't as close to your father, but you much closer to your mother. Your relationship with Quinn was a little mixed, but it only improved as things went on."

Daria shrugged, "She didn't appreciate me sleeping with her boyfriends until after college when she got engaged to that cheerleader. That was the first time I remember Quinn swinging that way."

"Well when your older sister steals then throws them away you become leery of boys in general. She did thank you during her hand binding however. So in the final evaluation, Nymphomaniac Daria wasn't your best run, but you did break your mean."

"Can I have another clean run like that one?" Daria asked.

"Planning another special run?" The old man asked.

Daria laughed and then carefully adjusted her facial expression. "Yes, I spent a lifetime as the queen bitch, now I'm going to go the other way. Let's see how Daria the Cynic scores."


	17. Girl in a Jar

This is a really long fragment for a Daria sci-fi AU. In it a biotech revolution has turned Earth on its head. Sometimes, however, little things get left behind when the word changes.

This is the story of one of those things.

OoOoOoOoOoO

Jane Lane, BFAC graduate of 2217 and artist for hire, shivered as her body adjusted to the lower temperature of the preservationist lab. Or at least that was what she was hoping the reaction was. Her latest job was sending her into the governmental storage facility were some of the most dangerous technology of the Gene Revolution was kept. Some of that stuff could destroy the world, but most of it had been kept ice for more than a century. If anything was going to escape it certainly wasn't waiting for her presence to do so . . . . She hoped.

The security men at the front door where actually quite surprising in their efficiency. Her camera had been rapidly checked from the bio-card to the batteries, each and every component check, and then rechecked, for illegal modifications. Her sketchpad drew more issues that the camera; apparently it had been a while since the guards had seen real pulp paper.

Next came the examination of Jane herself. Thankfully, Jane's own biomods were completely internal and benign, just the basic beta human package with a couple of eye mods. It was all her parents were able to afford. Jane would hate to see what the guards would do to someone who had bone spurs or some other weapon mod.

Nodding again to the guards, Jane took the proffered ID badge and waited for the airlock separating the facility from the rest of the world to cycle.

Jane couldn't help the eyebrow that went up when she meet the representative she would be meeting again. The voluptuous woman had the ears and tail of a rabbit, marking her as one of the rare Eros parahumans. The human variant had been breed by someone trying to pass himself as "the next Hugh Hefner". He commissioned two-hundred, all female, in an attempt to create "real playboy bunnies." The bathroom and pajamas he wore to his trial did not earn him any points with the jury. It had been too late to ethically abort the parahumans, so they were all brought to term. Jane was honestly surprised to see one working in a place like this.

"Let me guess," the woman began, "an Eros was the last thing you were expecting?"

Jane felt herself blush. "Sorry. I guess you get that all the time?"

"Often enough. My name is Anne Crossbee, facilities director." The woman offered her hand for Jane.

Jane took the hand and shook it. "Jane Lane, artist. Here on behalf of the ACLU."

"Good to see you Ms. Lane. And let me tell you, while I don't always believe in all the ACLU's crusades, I hope they win this one."

Anne lead Jane towards a few hallways to another, much larger airlock.

"I'll be honest," Jane said as the lock cycled, "my being here is a last second thing. The person they had originally booked got a chance to witness the Star Tree's launch. He took it, and I was the first person they were able to reach to come out and cover. Unfortunately, they didn't fill me in on all the details first."

Anne laughed, "Boy, sounds like 'they' would fit right in here. From what I understand, the ACLU wanted to do an article on Subject 14. It's her seventy-fifth anniversary."

Jane blinked as the airlock opened to reveal a very large chamber filed with vertical suspension tubes. Many of the tubes were obviously occupied, most by creatures Jane had never seen before, but a few were kind of familiar. "Why don't you give me some general background; what this facility is, what Subject 14 is, why is she slash it important, etc."

Anne nodded, "This is the US government genetic storage facility twenty-nine. We store whole specimen examples of advanced genetic engineering. Mostly prototypes and extreme oddities that have been thoroughly studied, but no one wants to dispose of because of possible future need."

Anne stopped and gestured at one of the tubes. Inside was a creature with brownish-yellow fur, almost the size of a basketball. "Take this for instance. Does it look familiar?"

Jane stared at the creature for a moment before her mind connected it with something she had seen long ago. "It looks sort of like a wardog that I saw in Dad's old World War III videos, but it is way too small."

Anne smiled. "Good catch. It is the first non-cybernetic version of a wardog. Technically it's a saboteur model. It is supposed to creep into enemy camps and generate EMP and knock out electrical equipment. Of course, they wouldn't be nearly as effective on the modern battlefield, but no one has managed to get a purely geneticly modified creature to generate as much voltage as this one, hence it is stored here in case anyone needs to study the effect again."

Anne began walking again, heading farther into the warehouse. "One of my sisters would probably be in here too, but a law enacted in _2183_ makes it illegal to freeze tube an otherwise non-dangerous sentient being indefinitely."

"Why do I think that date is important?" Jane commented, snapping random pictures of the warehouse.

"I'll get there," Anne promised. Much to Jane's surprise Anne stopped before a set of temporary walls set-up in one corner of the warehouse. "What can you tell me about the Gene Revolution? More specifically, on how it started." She asked.

Jane shrugged. "School said that some scientist discovered an entirely new form of life on a meteorite fragment. It could store massive amounts of energy in a tiny amount of mass, almost like living super-conductor. The cells were too aggressive though, so they modified them to be less efficient, but non-mobile, which lead to modern bio-batteries." Jane lifted her camera as an example.

"And in the process, modern genetic science was invented," Anne concluded. "That was an almost perfect textbook rendition, Jane. There's just one thing missing."

Intrigued, Jane took the hook. "And what's missing, Professor Anne?"

The Eros laughed. "How did the scientist discover the life form to begin with?" With this comment, Anne turned and walked around the dividing wall. Jane followed, and stopped immediately.

In this lonely corner of a cavernous warehouse sat a single biotube. Inside it a seemingly human teen floated in a fetal position. Like all the animal subjects in the rest of the warehouse she wore no clothing, only a mass of free-floating hair gave even a pretense to modesty. The area around the biotube was well lit, and had numerous cards and drawings scattered about it.

"It's simple, Jane," Anne continued, standing in front of the tube. "They found the first cells in the body of a young girl that had become infected with them after taking a nature hike with her middle school class."

"Government files call her Subject 14," Anne concluded, "But originally her name was Daria Morgendorffer."

///////////////////////////

GURPS BioTech was a big help for ideas for this fragment, as was Palladium's Splicers. Can you spot the two hidden crossovers?


	18. Hell of a Sister

I'm going to offend somebody with this, I just know it. Still I couldn't get this scene out of my head until I wrote it, so here it is.

OoOoOoOoOoO

Quinn looked over at her 'sister' and sighed. 'There she goes again.' Quinn thought.

In the comfort and safety of their home Daria didn't waste the effort in disguising what she was. Truthfully, the tiny red horns were just barely visible through Daria's hair. Thankfully, Daria thought the effort required to manifest her traditional tail and wings was rarely worth it.

"What is it Quinn?" Daria asked, not looking up from the book she was reading.

"Tell me again why my parents thought summoning a demon was a good idea?" Quinn asked.

Daria sighed. "I guess you want to hear the more complete version this time?" When Quinn nodded Daria smiled. "The first thing you need to understand is that your parents _are_ hippies. And as hippies your parents, and the rest of their commune, thought that free love would save the world. They also thought that if they just believed hard enough they could make anyone see the 'light'."

Quinn saw where this was going. "What were they smoking?"

Daria laughed, "If you really want to know you'll want to hit the bathroom first. It'd take me half an hour to list everything they were smoking. Moving on, one night they were smoking a stronger mix than the usual and decided to put their theory to the test. It took them about two weeks, most of which they spent bombed out of their minds, but in the end they did manage to summon a demon . . . ."

"You." Quinn stated flatly.

Daria nodded back. "In a couple of ways they got both very lucky and very unlucky. Their ritual worked, but they got exactly what they asked for. Not too long after that someone sobered up enough to realize what they had done."

"So why didn't they banish you then?" Quinn asked curiously.

The succubus shrugged. "They couldn't. Summoning rituals are very elaborate; near the end of each one the 'primary' ritualist designates a reversal phrase. It's sort of like a safe word for summoning. The ritualist says it and the summon instantly disappears."

"And I repeat," Quinn asked, "Why hasn't anyone said it to you yet? Not that I necessarily want you gone or anything, it's nice having an older sister. Every once and a while."

Daria smiled at the Morgendorffer's only child. "Remember how you asked what they were smoking? Well whatever it is, it screwed with their memories. Not one of the people there even remembered what was said, let alone who said it."

"And now you're stuck here."

"Until the primary summoner dies or says the phrase by accident," Daria agreed. "But I'm rather enjoying my time here. The abyss is so unpredictable it actually becomes predictable after a while. And yes I know how oxymoronic that sounds."

"So why are you hanging out around _my _parents?"

Daria shrugged, "They were the first to leave the commune. I doubt either one is the diabolist that can send me home, but frankly I just wanted to get out of there. A demon can only take so many attempts to convert her to the 'light' before she wants to do something 'dark'."

Quinn sighed and shifted in her chair a little. "I get the whole, "demon's are agents chaos, not evil" thing, thanks for getting me kicked out of Sunday School by the way, but are all succubi as . . . nice as you?"

Daria laughed. "Not really. I'm not really into the whole 'evil demon' shtick. Most succubi could have, and probably would have, drained that commune dry. I was more interested in something long term. As long as my summoner is still alive I can do more or less what I want. I keep my head down to stay me under the radar of anyone else with the ability to banish me."

Quinn opened her mouth to ask another question, but a suddenly look of shock passed over her face and she turned both pale and green simultaneously.

"What?" Daria asked.

"I just realized something." Quinn said distractidly. "Succubi are sex demons aren't they?"

"Yes." Daria confirmed

"And my parents summoned you in the sixties right?"

"Yes."

Quinn's face became even greener. "You slept with my Dad, didn't you?"

"Actually . . . ." Daria began slowly.

"Just tell me all ready!" Quinn shouted.

"I've slept with both your parents, together and separately." The succumbus said bluntly.

Daria paused for a moment before a wicked grin came over her face. "Your Dad is pretty good, lots of endurance, but your Mom . . . well, she's more of a 'sex fiend' than I am."

If it had been possible Quinn would have turned even greener. "Are you sure you aren't evil?"

The demon just laughed.

Daria waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. "I'm semi-retired for now. I haven't slept with either of your parents since Helen became pregnant with you."

Quinn blinked, "Wait, you mean my mother was pregnant with me before they got married?"

"Quinn, your parents aren't married now." Daria said with a laugh. "They _are_ hippies remember? Your mother changed her last aright around the time you turned four and that was only because she was getting tired of getting hit on."

"But what about their wedding rings?" Quinn got out over her shock.

"Technically they're not wedding rings." the demon said, "Just jewelry in the appropriate places to look like such."

OoOoOoOoOoO

"And you swear you've never slept with any of my boyfriends?" Quinn asked.

Daria sighed, "Swearing is a serious thing for supernaturals, Quinn." The demon exclaimed. "But, yes I've never slept with any of your boyfriends."

A quick look of horror flashed over Quinn's face. "What about those two idiots?"

Now it was Daria's turn to turn green. "Bevis and Butthead; eww _no_. I may be a demon of lust and sex, but I have standards."

OoOoOoOoOoO Thank Ranger Thorne for this last scene OoOoOoOoOoO

Raising an eyebrow, Quinn next asked, "And Jane?"

"Despite the rumors she strictly a stick-shift kind of girl."

"And Trent?"

Daria just smiled as she pretended to pick something out of her teeth.


	19. The Dragon in Me

"So found another princess I see." Trent Lane said as Daria Morgendorffer left the Lane residence.

Jane shot her brother a _look_. "We've discussed this before, Trent. I am not looking for a princess." Jane snorted, "And besides, Daria would be _highly _insulted if you called her that."

"Even better," Trent countered, "You wouldn't want one of the spoiled ones anyway."

Sighing in exasperation Jane shook her head. "Read my lips Trent, I do not want a princess."

Trent laughed. "Of course you want a princess, all of you want princess it's part of who you are."

Trent paused and closed his eyes. For a brief instance he wavered, as if he was a pond reflection that had been disturbed. When the distortion stopped the slacker that had been standing there was gone. In his place a seven foot tall creature of muscle and multicolored scales stood casually. An ignorant observer might have called him a cross between a crocodile and a human. Someone in the know would have told the ignorant observer that Trent was not as mundane as that.

"All dragons want to have a princess of their own." Trent concluded.

Jane sighed and suppressed the brief stab of envy that always accompanied Trent's causal transformation into his true form. It was hardly his fault that Jane's last growth spurt had rendered her too large to revert in spaces as small as he could. Consider that the growth spurt had made her own true form about the size of a horse, maneuvering about the house in her draconic shape had been sadly removed from her list of 'fun things to do when you're alone.'

Once again Jane pondered the oddity that was dragon genetics. When a dragon mated with a non-dragon, like their draconic mother had with their very human father, the results of that union depended on the sex of the child. Children that matched their draconic parent's sex were born dragons themselves; children of the opposite sex were born as more humanoid, but still inhuman, dragonborn. Thankfully both species were natural shape shifters, and while Jane hadn't been able maintain a human form full-time until she was five, it had been enough to at least withstand temporary scrutiny.

It had not been long after that when their parents began their current habit of spending more of the year away from the Lane homestead than in it. Their mother traveled the world keeping an eye on her various collections, i.e. hordes; and their father, not really finding the position of being the only true human in the house a comfortable one, began taking more and more overseas jobs.

Shortly thereafter the older siblings had all moved out on their own. Summer had mostly rejected her draconic nature and was currently trying very hard to get her children to disregard theirs; a task she was quite seriously failing at. Wind had his own issues, with two marriages having collapsed because of his draconic heritage and a third on the rocks. Penny had apparently decided to try going the other way and was living out of a cave in South America living 'as close to the way of ancestors did as possible.'

Trent had his band of course. And one of these days he might figure out how to get the rest of his dragonborn accent out of his human voice.


	20. The Magic in KnickKnacks

The Magic of Knick-Knacks

This drabble involves a partial crossover with the world of Harry Potter.

More specifically, it includes HP style magic, with additions, into the Daria world. Daria and company are still in America, Harry Potter and friends are in Brittan, and it is highly unlikely that the two would meet.

Still some events in the HP story will have an impact on at least one Daria character.

Decided I was picking on Daria a little too much, decided to shift my targets a little.

oOoOoOoOoO

"So you're a witch?" Daria asked her best friend.

"No," Jane corrected, not looking up from the sketchpad she was working on, "I'm an artificer, which is a kind of a warlock. There are a number of differences between the two."

"Like?" Daria asked. Looking over Jane's shoulder Daria tried to make sense of the symbols and circles covering the page. After a moment Daria realized that she couldn't even tell the starting point of the work and gave up before she developed a headache.

"Well for one thing, you'll never catch me waving a little stick around." Jane looked up and noticed her friend's confused expression. "Warlocks and witches both get our power from the same place; a pool of magic inside of us called a magical core. Witches draw that power out and shape it into spells with the aid of a focus. Most of them use wands as focuses, short wood sticks filled with magically reactive materials."

"Clichéd much?" Daria said dryly.

Jane shrugged. "They seem to like it and the cliché had to have come from somewhere. Artificers pre-shape our spells by building them into objects and then powering those objects from our cores."

"That sounds a lot less efficient." Daria commented/questioned.

Jane smiled and returned her attention to the sketchpad. "It's certainly slower, but unlike most witches I can craft my own spells. That means I can do things that a witch wouldn't be able to do because no one has created a spell to do it. Now, some witches can craft new spells, but it's a lot harder for them. They can't use computers to help them, for instance."

"Why not?" Daria asked.

"Most witches have issues with electricity," Jane answered. Jane once again put her pencil aside and looked up at her friend. "My enchantments use every drop of magic I put into them. Witches aren't anywhere near as clean. A lot of their spells waste half the power put into them. Most witches use magic for everything, so they end up spraying a lot of extra magic around. Overtime that magic builds up into an invisible magical 'fog'. Complex electronics fail in the presence of that much lingering magic."

"Interesting." Daria commented dryly. Daria gestured at Jane's pad and changed tracks. "What are you working on now?"

Jane rubbed the back of her head in embarrassment. "You remember the shoes right?"

"Yes, the puddles jumped out of your way before you stepped in them."

Jane laughed depreciatively. "That was supposed to just make my shoes dry faster by repelling water. I made the spell way too strong and the water was repelled before the shoes even got wet. I'm toning it down so it does what it was supposed to do."

"It's always the little details that get you," Daria commented.

"Too true," Jane replied. "Usually I do a better job enchanting than that; my teacher is so going to have words with me the next time we meet. At least I don't have to keep secrets from my best friend anymore."

"And do things usually go wrong?"

Jane blushed and returned to her work. "I am just a student; I do get it right more often than not though. Check out some of the things in that drawer there."

Opening the indicated desk draw Daria found it filled with miscellaneous bric-a-brac. Selecting an item at random, Daria pulled a pair of oversized prop glasses out. A careful examination found tiny just barely glowing symbols along the inside stems. Daria cautiously peered through the lenses, but didn't see anything different about the view on the other side.

"What do the big glasses do?" Daria asked her friend.

Still drawing, Jane's reply was made in a distracted tone. "A bunch of things. I made them to win a bet with another artificer. Janice bet I couldn't make glasses with more than two spells on them. I won fifty bucks with those puppies. They only have one bug."

Daria let the prop glasses settle on her nose in front of her own. "What's that?" Daria asked, as she turned to face her friend. Daria face instantly turned to the hue of a ripe tomato and she quickly turned back around.

"Janice wore them for a week before paying up." Jane answered. "She complained that the spell trigger for the 'x-ray spec' enchantment kept going off. I thought for sure she was going to welsh; but she suddenly she returned them and paid up. Started going out with Upchuck a few days later."

"Interesting," Daria said distractedly. Quickly Daria put the prop glasses back in the desk. What she failed to notice was that the symbols were no longer on the prop's stems.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

"Is that an owl?" Daria asked, "An owl carrying a letter?"

"Yeah," Jane replied, taking the letter from the owl's leg. "It's how wizards pass messages around."

"You know," Daria said mildly, eyeing the large flying predator, "for a society that's number one goal is to remain hidden they don't do subtle very well. A pigeon would at least blend in a little."

Jane laughed as the owl flew off in a huff. "They used to use pigeons, but sometimes the message wouldn't get where it was going. According to one of my texts, after losing three message pigeons in a row, a wizard enchanted the killer of his last messenger to deliver the message instead. The idea caught on and within a generation everyone was using owls to deliver messages."


	21. Sleeping Gods

The fifteen year Quinn Morgendorffer sighed as she carefully reached up to put a small jade statue of a fox on a high shelf in her new room. The move from Highland had been well timed; any longer and there might have been an incident, but rebuilding her room was still a chore. More so for her because she knew how important getting everything placed correctly really was.

"How's this?" the girl asked out loud as she turned the statue to a slight angle to the shelf.

"Do you want added protection or sexual powers?" A quite male voice asked from behind her.

Quinn sighed, "The former of course."

"Just asking; rotate it little more to the statue's right." the voice replied. "May I ask why you didn't want the padded room? Its energy flows don't need quite as many adjustments as this room does."

"I have a couple of reasons," Quinn said as she hopped down from the chair. "One: It's only going to be a matter of time until Dad's gets the renovation bug again; and the first thing Mom will put on his list is that room."

The wince was actually audible in the male voice, "In which case you'll be moved here 'temporarily' while Jake fixes the room."

Quinn nodded while picking up a rolled poster. "And considering how well Dad's last project went I might as well start in here and save myself the effort of moving. Second, I don't want to give Mom another link to associate 'Quinn' with 'crazy' especially after last time."

Unrolling the poster of a forest meadow, Quinn positioned it on the wall. "And third: I didn't want to have to fight Daria for it. Here good?"

"Good guess," the voice replied, "but I'd move it at least three feet to the left, if you mounted that there you'd have trouble sleeping during nights when the moon was full. Incidentally I want to apologize for that again, but if those two idiots managed to break the seal on the box we'd have been neck deep in vengeful spirits before you could blink twice."

"I didn't mind, well much at least," Quinn said as she affixed the poster, "I could have done without the public nudity but since I prefer my soul unconsumed I can live with the embarrassment."

"And again I apologize for that. I had no idea ritual backlash would manifest like that. Hang the clear crystal in the second pane for the left, two up."

"And again, it wasn't that big of deal," Quinn replied as she hung the small crystal orb as directed, "considering the alternatives I could have been hit with a lot worse. And you're sealed remember?"

"Quinn, I'm Thais, the God of Magic. Sealed or not I should have known that was possible."

Quinn walked over to her desk and picked up a small rag doll dressed in wizard's robes. Giving the doll a hug she said, "Don't worry about it Thais, you're still my favorite god I know."

"I'm the only god you know," Thais pointed out.

"You say tomato."


	22. Of Gears and Gearheads

The young lieutenant paced back and forth nervously in the briefing room of the hastily constructed underground bunker. Fears bounced around in her head so furiously that they were colliding in her thoughts. Would she be ordered into combat? Would she _not_ be ordered into combat? Would she be able to control her weapon if she had to fight? Could se survive losing control of the weapon if she couldn't?

The briefing room door slid open with a faint hiss and the lieutenant snapped to attention as the base commander approached. The commander, a general who had been forced out of active combat duties when he lost his right arm to enemy fire, eyed the Lieutenant like the green recruit she was. The Lieutenant didn't begrudge the look even for an instant; the General had seen more campaigns that she had years.

"At east Lieutenant," the General ordered. "Now normally I'd never consider deploying a newbie Operator into combat as thick as this no matter what the damn tests say, but I've suddenly found myself having no choice."

"Sir, I know my duty, Sir!" The Lieutenant barked as she had been taught at Basic.

"I said at ease Lieutenant," The General ordered, "We're too damn close to the front line to waste time on that parade formal bullshit. Your lack of experience is even worse in this case because you haven't had real experience with a Gear, but every experienced Operator we have are keeping the Fedies' Furies off the main thrust."

"What are my orders, sir?" The Lieutenant asked.

"You are to proceeded at once to the Gear bay to activate your Gear," The General rumbled in the tones of command, "and proceed with all due speed to Sector 95-G, waypoint 5. Once there you are to assist an embattled assault team with capturing a Fedie communication post. I would consider live prisoners, especially technical and command personnel, to be a bonus. In the event the post cannot be captured intact, it is to be razed to the ground instead. Beyond that your standing orders as an Operator apply. You are dismissed."

"Sir, yes Sir!" The Lieutenant barked, but before she could leave the briefing room the General stopped her.

"Lieutenant," The General said in a less formal tone, "Let me give you a bit of off-the-record advice. I know this is your first engagement, but it is _not_ your Gear's first time to the rodeo. It's stubborn, obstinate, and insubordinate as hell, but it does know what it's doing and you should listen to its advice. On the other hand never forget that at the end of the day _you_ are the boss."

The Lieutenant nodded gratefully, "I will Sir. Thank you Sir."

The General gave the female solider a friendly clout on the shoulder with his good hand. "Then get going Lieutenant Lane, and good luck."

/

Lieutenant Jane Lane, Operator in the People's Confederated Alignment of Planets, sighed as she entered the Gear bay. Really it was a bit of a push calling it a bay, as only one Gear coffin was present. When this particular concealed base had been constructed far behind enemy lines it had been designed primarily as an underground listening post. It was deemed too risky and too inefficient to have multiple Gears stored within the secret base, so only one cradle had been installed during construction. It wasn't until General Edgeforth himself had taken command of the base that the cradle had been occupied at all.

Jane had always found the bay to be a barren and empty place. Positioned in the deepest point of the underground base, no one who didn't need to ever walked through the two foot thick reinforced blast doors. Fewer still stood in front of the huge reinforced coffin that was offered protection, repair, and confinement for the Gear deactivated inside.

Tapping in her long security password Jane found herself once again considering the existence of the heavy weapons referred to as Gears. A fusion of organic and inorganic technologies, each Gear was unique and cost the Confederation as much as a modest fleet of star-cruisers. Considered to be the most powerful weapon ever on a volume-to-volume basis, any Gear could easily destroy said space fleet without straining its reserves.

Unfortunately, said power came with a price. The learning machines guiding each Gear had to be carefully supervised or they could potentially cause havoc amongst their own troops. A special cybernetic interface had been designed to allow someone to control a Gear's wilder impulses, but it was soon discover that not just anyone was capable of accepting the implant. On top of that, the Gear's themselves were . . . picky about the person who held their 'leash'.

Jane had been in for the shock of her life several months ago. She had initially had signed up with the army to complete her citizenship requirement. She had been aiming to be the first Lane in generations to achieve full citizenship. When the mandatory physical revealed that she could receive a Gear Controller Implant, the Confederation offered her a deal she couldn't refuse; full citizenship for her family and all her descendants and a _very_ generous pay scale. The trade-off was that Jane would become the Cricket of a psychotic super-weapon for the duration of the current conflict with the Federation of Stars.

Finally getting the last of her long security password in, Jane watched the small control panel as the Gear inside was awakened.

BIOS Loading . . . . Loaded

Start-up Power Cell . . . Charged

Activating Secondary Control Core . . . . Activated

Activating Interspace Reactor . . . . . . . . . . . . . Start-up Achieved

Running Level 3 Diagnosis . . . . No errors detected

Primary Control Core Activation In Progress . . . . .

Dynamic

Automated-Response

Interspace

Attacker

. . . . Activation achieved.

large snip

"Do you think we can win this damn war?" the grunt asked.

"Depends on what you mean by win, and what you mean by war," Daria interrupted from across the room. The handful of grunts that started to hush the war machine were silenced by the other soldiers in the room. A military analyst would have been very surprised to learn that the action was more to hear what the Gear was going to say, rather than fear of what the Gear would do if they interrupted.

"If the Federation leaders play to type they won't surrender." Daria continued, "Too much of their power is derived from war and if that was ever taken away from them the people might remember that they can actually choose their leaders. That gives the war-council three choices I can see. One: repeat this battle ground all over again on the Federation capital world. Only it would be even more costly because of how heavily defended it is. Two: forget the Accords and slag the Federation capital to the bedrock."

"The political repercussions would be a nightmare," one of the brighter soldiers commented.

The Gear nodded, "And almost guarantees that the next interstellar war would be pointed straight at the Confederation. Third: put the federation home world under blockade. Like most class IV worlds the Fedie home planet isn't self-sufficient. Keep it under blockade long enough and we should be able to starve them into surrender."

"Again a political nightmare," the same grunt commented, "But less so than mass genocide."

"Especially since the military leadership will horde resources so they don't have to give up their 'toys'," another grunt sneered, "and I bet the PR guys will have a field day."

The war machine gave both commenting soldiers a nod of acknowledgement. "As far as winning here goes," Daria continued, "It's only a matter of time. There are only a few objectives left to achieve."

"Finding that damn submerged fleet," an officer growled.

"That's one," Daria replied, waving hand. "But not as vital as you think. The real mission is to finish eliminating the Fedie ground-to-space artillery, wiping out their remaining heavy weapons emplacements, and destroying the facilities they're using to make Furies."

"But what about those damn starships?" The officer asked. "The second the Fleet moves on they'll launch and jump it from behind."

"No," Daria argued calmly, "the second those ships launch they'll be targeted by the ground-to-space artillery we're going to replace theirs with. Fedie ships are trans-atmospheric but they aren't _fast _in atmosphere. Any half-way competent gunner could knock the whole fleet out of the air before they even made orbit. Our true goal here is to clear out all the obstacles that prevent the engineers from building that artillery."


	23. Me and My Warship

With a snarl of frustration a woman in a quite room typed away at a computer with sharp angry movements. "I know the safe precautions seem obvious and only a total idiot would do it, but you have to remember your product is used by worse than idiots. They won't read the damn manual either, but you have to make the safety precautions obvious and in the front or they'll sue when they do the stupid things you forgot to cover."

Sending the file on its merry way the woman leaned back and ran tired fingers through shoulder length brown hair. "And yet another exciting moment ends in the life of Daria Morgendorffer, technical editor and professional hermit. Mom would say I need to get a life."

_Pilot Daria Morgendorffer vitals well within acceptable limits._

Hearing the matter-of-fact voice echoing through her head Daria pinched the bridge of her nose. "What did I tell you about talking to me when I'm working?"

This time the voice had a plaintive whine in it that Daria associated with the young [i]_Pilot Daria Morgendorffer is not working at this time.[/_i]

Sighing Daria finished shutting down her computer. "That's technically true, but you know that it's just that; a technicality. What's on your mind?"

_Detection threat._ the voice said in a more serious tone. _Unregistered biological signals have approached with potential discovery range. Instructions requested._ The last was in tone which contained intense worry and sure knowledge that Daria could fix it.

Daria smiled faintly as she went to the apartment's small refrigerator. "It's not another deer is it?"

_Negative._ The voice said sheepishly. _Biological entities labeled 'deer' added to list of non-threats along with squirrels, dogs, mice, bats,_

Daria interrupted before the voice could continue with the very long list of local wildlife. "I take it then that these are people?"

_Affirmative. Recon drone observing._

"And their chances of stumbling across you are?" Daria trailed off.

_Probability low_ the voice 'said' petulantly, as if admitting something it didn't want to. _But probability is __**non-zero**__!_

"I wouldn't worry about it too much" Daria said calmly. "All the entrances are very well concealed and you did plug the hole I fell through. So I . . ."

A loud ring cut Daria off. The phone rang four more times before Daria realized what she had heard and answered the phone that she had received from her apartment's internet bundle. "Daria Morgendorffer."

"Hey amiga."

Daria froze. That voice could **not** be who she thought it was. "Is this Jane Lane speaking?"

"Yeah" Jane said with a rueful laugh. "Been a long time since we spoke huh?"

_Pilot stress increasing._

"Yes" Daria said in tones of pure frost, "several years in fact. If I remember correctly you hung up on me last time."

The wince on the other side of the line was almost audible. "Err, yeah. That was a bad time."

"And the time before that?" Daria asked sarcastically. "And the time before that too?"

This time the wince did make it over the phone line.

"Jane," Daria said in not-quite-a-snarl "I pegged Jodie for getting lost in her work, not you. But we were still friends, until that day you cut me off!"

Pilot _stress above acceptable limits, preparing combat drone._ The voice said into Daria's head in distress.

"_**NO**_!" Daria shouted both out loud and mentally to the voice. On the phone Jane spluttered in shock. '_No combat drones!_' Daria thought '_this isn't the kind of situation you can fix by blowing something up_.'

"I was in a bad place that day Jane, a very bad one, and damnit I need some goddamn support! Even a damn sympathetic ear would have been enough, but no the artist-extraordinary had gotten to busy for her former friend."

Daria heard Jane sigh over the line. "You're right Daria," she said slowly, "What I did was unforgivable. And you know what, this whole phone call's probably only going to make things worse."

A cold dread hit Daria's stomach as the voice in her head muttered _Recommend preliminary tactical strike._

'_No_' Daria thought to the voice. '_Last I heard Jane lived hundreds of miles away from here. Second, your idea of tactical will turn wherever Jane is into a smoking crater!_'

_Combat drones have a maximum atmospheric speed of Mach fifteen and are capable of precision attacks_. the voice complained.

"See I'm not calling for myself," Jane continued, unaware of the other conversation Daria was having.

'_I'll take you advice into consideration._' "Then who are you calling for," Daria asked out loud. "And why do I feel as if I am not going to like the answer?"

A sigh echoed over the line. "Listen, Daria I really didn't want to do this, and I don't blame you if you hung up right now . . . but your Dad wanted me to pass something onto you."

All of Daria emotions slammed to a stop. When she next spoke her tone could only be summarized as dead. "What?"

"There's a big family reunion coming up" Jane explained. "They're getting together to celebrate your niece's birthday. Your Dad wanted me to tell you that he would really like it if you came, but all his contact numbers are out of date. He invited me too," Jane said with a dark chuckle, "I guess he didn't know we aren't speaking to each other."

Daria pinched her nose even as she let out a dark chuckle of her own. "Do you still like drama Jane?"

"My whole life's been drama lately" Jane said. "But I'm always up for some cheap entertainment."

"Do you remember me saying that any Morgendorffer reunion is likely to turn into riot?"

"Yeah." Jane said slowly.

Daria's chuckle had no humor in it. "Well get your hip waders, there is going to be blood."


	24. Spy School

Scene: Camera is flying over an ocean, a seagull pulls into the shot and the camera slows to follow its slightly erratic flight path.

On screen narration: It is a well known fact that the American government routinely over-pays for many of its day-to-day essentials. Many people suspect that the 'extra' money goes to pay for projects the government will not admit exists.

Scene: An island appears in the seagull's flight path.

On screen narration: This is true.

Scene: As the island grows larger buildings can be made out.

On screen narration: What the public doesn't know is that even these secret projects over-pay as well.

Scene: The island has gotten close enough that buildings can now be seen clearly. They resemble a fairly typical two story school house with a scattering of outlying buildings.

On screen narration: This money goes to projects even more secret than Top-Secret, including one particular school for the gifted. These students are the best and the brightest in sports, intelligence, personality, and other, more obscure standards. They are gathered from all over the US for specific training. They are training to be . . . .

Scene: As the seagull flies over the island the clock-face on the school shifts aside. A cannon pops out of the space and begins to fire. The seagull explodes into a cloud of _oil and mechanical parts_. The barrels of the gun smoke for a second then retract back into the building.

On screen narration: Spies.

Scene: The camera stops when the seagull is destroyed.

On screen narration: And the name for this beyond Top-Secret school is . . . .

Scene: The cannon reappears and starts shooting again, this time at the narration. The words flee of screen but one or two of the trailing words are hit and explode into pixels.

Daria Morgendorffer and Company in:

Spy School

/

Scene: Hallway, seems a fairly typical school hallway. The bulletin boards and posters are all digital screens though. Daria and Jane are standing next to some lockers which have electronic thumbprint locks. A bulleting board just in the shot reads 'Spy shot down today'. Amongst other silly lines on the board are 'Spygulls: 7' and 'Narration text: 1'.

Jane (cheerfully): Morning amiga. Welcome back to the wonderful world of [several loud **blams** cover up what Jane says. On the board Spygull changes to 8.] Where have you been the last few days?

Daria (grumpier than usual, pulling things from locker): Some nut ball was trying to change the world's supply of gold into chocolate. Want to guess who was assigned to stop her?

Jane (curious): I thought Animal Agent Program handled most of the real screw-balls. (Shrugs cheerfully) But hey, it's was a few days off campus, what's there to grump about?

Daria hands Jane a list. We see 'Action Report' on the list before Jane takes it and starts to peruse.

Jane (to herself): Couple of wild card slots, a face of your choice . . . . Wait does this say Brittany and _Kevin_ were assigned to you?

Daria nods dejectedly and closes her locker.

Jane (still reading): This ammo count can't be right; you were stopping a junior mad scientist, not taking over a third-world county. (Pauses, before continuing with a tone of understanding) Wait, you had _Kevin_ on your team . . . .

Daria slams her head on the locker a couple of times.

/

This can basically be blamed on a recent viewing of DEBS and is not meant to be taken seriously AT ALL. Basically think over-the-top spy-spoof taken to 11. In this world there are mad-scientists who are actively trying to knock California into the Pacific. Not for some revenge scheme or an attempt to get beach-front property in Nevada, but for their 8th grade science project on earthquakes. (Though there are some people trying to do in California for the first two reasons as well.)

Daria wants to be an analyst and stay strictly behind the scenes. Her 'perfect' poker face has many of the students and faculty thinking/wanting her to be a field agent or a leader however and Daria greatly resents being frequently pushed into those positions.

Jane is the school's best forger (better than the teachers on a good day) and is also in training for being a secret courier/wheelman.

Quinn is a 'face' and keeps up with fashion not just to stand out, but to blend in too (but only when necessary).

Kevin is a heavy weapon specialist. He has unbelievable accuracy, but can't always be trusted to know what to shoot. Or when to _stop_ shooting. Thankfully his equally crazy luck prevents friendly-fire and even when he's shooting what he shouldn't things turn out alright . . . . Most of the time.

Michael "Mack" Mackenzie is another weapon specialist. He doesn't have Kevin's supernatural accuracy and luck, but at least he knows when _not_ to shoot.

Jodie is a junior politico and face. She seems particularly skilled at infiltrating groups and working her way into place of power.

Upchuck is a surveillance specialist and hacker of some note. His habit of 'practicing' his skills on the girl's locker room is sure to get him shot one day though.

Most of the time Brittany poses as an airhead 'seductress' but in truth she is the school's top field-student and shoe-in for a double-oh position as soon as she graduates. Rumor has it that she is one already.


End file.
